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DIARY OF A TOUR 

IN THE AUTUMN OF 1856 


GIBRALTAR, MALTA, SMYRNA, DARDANELLES, MARMORA, 

CONSTANTINOPLE, 

SCUTARI, SWEET WATERS, GREECE, ITALY, SICILY AND FRANCE, 


BY 

JAMES SULLIVAN: 

PRINTED FOR PRESENTATION TO HIS FRIENDS. 


The Drawings, which are copied, with some variations, from Miss Pardoe’s volume, are Lithographed by W. Waring. 


APRIL, 1857. 




























am 


205449 

’13 


6 





CONTENTS. 

LIVERPOOL and Environs. 

ON BOARD THE TENERIFFE. 

BAY OF BISCAY. 

CINTRA, Cape St. Vincent. 

GIBRALTAR. 

MEDITERRANEAN, Granada, Algeria. 

MALTA, Valetta, Gozzo. 

ARABS. 

GREECE, Syra, Greek Passengers. 

ASIA MINOR, Smyrna, Troy, Birth-Place of Homer. 

DARDANELLES, Hero and Leander, Gallipoli. 

SEA OF MARMORA or Propontis. 

CONSTANTINOPLE, Hippodrome, Aqueducts, Bazaars, Turkish Traders, Money and Money 
Changers. 

GOLDEN HORN, Caiques, Turkish Ladies, Sweet Waters of Europe. 

TURKISH FORCES. 

MY FIRST TCHIBOUQUE. 

FRANK QUARTER, Galata, Watch Tower, Divan, Hotels and Cafes. 

AUSTRIAN STEAMERS. 

PERA, Misseri’s Hotel, Captain Mississippi, Major Smaulmakup, Herr Fitzmudlewhell. 

CHAMPS DES MORTS or Cemeteries of Turkey. 

MOSQUES, Mahommedan Worship. 

CONSTANTINOPLE. 

STEAMERS IN TURKEY. 

BOSPHORUS, Turkish Villages, Turkish Pic-Nxc. 

SCUTARI, Turkish Funeral. 

DANCING DERVISHES, HOWLING DERVISHES. 

GANGE Mail Boat, Cabin. 

PIRiEUS, Athens, KlepthS, Acropolis, Greeks and Maltese. 

ITALY, Calabria. 

SICILY, Messina, Beggars. 

SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS. 

GULF OF LYONS. 

FRANCE, Marseilles, Harbour, Town, Douane. 

LYONS. 

FRENCH RAILWAYS and Officials. 

PARIS, Improvements, Foreign Guard. 

ROUEN. 

HAVRE. 

SOUTHAMPTON. 

RESUME. 



































* 








THE SULTANA IN HER STATE ARABA 





m 

DIARY OF A TOUR TO CONSTANTINOPLE. 


LIVERPOOL. 

Arrived from London at half-past three, a.m. ; drove to Radley’s Hotel, and 
was accommodated with a garret, containing several beds, with a window 
in the roof through which the light poured at break of day, and, like Macbeth, 
“ murdered sleep.” Breakfasted and went to the Shipping Agent’s, and found 
that the time of sailing was postponed four days beyond the time advertised, 
which afforded an opportunity of seeing this fine large town, with its long 
broad streets, handsome public buildings, extensive poor-house, numerous small 
fountains, and six miles of docks. The steamers plying on the Mersey pre¬ 
vented the ennui which, without some occupation, would inevitably have 
resulted from the tedium of a four days’ delay when all anxiety to see foreign 
and romantic lands. Crossed the river to Woodside Ferry, and walked to 
Birkenhead Market, and to Birkenhead Park, divided by a public road into 
two parts, each division as large as St. James’s, with a lake, shady walks, 
islands and aquatic birds; to New Brighton, built on the sands of the shore, 
where pretty villas and parks are rapidly springing up, and at some distant 
period this village may become as attractive as its prototype in Sussex. Men 
and women bathe together from one machine. Visited the Rock Ferry Hotel 
Garden of choice flowers, the resort of working men and their families, where, 
wafted from the crowd and din of Liverpool, the beauty of the flowers and the 
refreshing breeze from the river relax their over-tasked energies. 

ON BOARD THE TENERIFFE. 

August 6th. Left Liverpool for Constantinople on a charming day, with 
a fair wind, about twenty cabin passengers, forty sailors and firemen, three 
officers, and a shrewd careful captain who had been many years at sea— 
had saved a fortune and lost it by lending it to a Company that subsequently 
failed. He had not intended to go to sea any more, having a wife and family, 
but was compelled to start again in consequence of his losses. He is jocose, 
jolly, full of information, very absolute, presides at table, and, having travelled 
much, speaks authoritatively, much to the surprise of a young gentleman, 
a Maltese by birth, who has just taken a degree at Edinburgh, and has on 

his card “ Doctor D-.” This youngster is as positive and absolute as 

the captain, rash in his observations, vain of his person and family, carries 
with him the portrait of his chere amie , and would cudgel any one who could 
not discover in it all the charms that woman could possess. Then there is 



Mrs W., a well-educated lady, with two handsome children. She is high 
and amiable, vain and kind, enquires whether one knows Lord B., and Captain 
C., sings solos and takes first tenor in glees and duets, and dances quadrilles 
with us on deck in the evening; she is en route to Constantinople to meet 
her husband. Mrs Captain T. is also en route meet her husband at Gozzo, 
near Malta, and this lady is the wife of a captain in the English army, is 
very agreeable, a fine creature, but too retiring, and not sufficiently conver¬ 
sational. She also has two children, who, however, like the “ cherubim, con¬ 
tinually do cry.” Miss F., a young Irish lady, is going to Malta; she is good 
looking, conversational, can appreciate a bon mot, a piece of good music, and 
an act of politeness; retiring and modest, without the easy commanding man¬ 
ners of Mrs W., yet exceedingly interesting; does not sing, although she has 
an excellent taste in music; is my partner in the waltz on deck in the evening, 
and an attentive listener to the Byronic readings in the afternoon ; wishes I 
would write some original poetry instead of always reading Byron’s, and, next 
day, expresses her approval of the accompanying Sonnet—“ To Miss F. on 
the Ocean ”—subsequently set to music. Two brothers, Germans, professors 
of the violin, and the wife of one of them, an Austrian lady of high birth, 
discarded by her relatives for marrying a good, clever man without a title, 
are going to Malta professionally. All three are very agreeable, and the 
brothers play duets and arrange parts for our evening concerts. Mr W. is 
a scholar without pedantry, an excellent social companion, ready to do any¬ 
thing for anybody, a first-rate sailor, and in constant requisition to perform 
minor but important services ; nothing comes amiss to him. He has just 
been to Jersey to oblige a relative, and is now mending a fan to oblige a 
passenger. The other passengers have no strongly marked peculiarities. 

BAY OF BISCAY. 

August 7th. Entered this celebrated Bay, which well sustained its character; 
at first a slight rocking only was perceptible, which, however, increased in 
strength by midnight, and the full force of waves rolling unimpeded probably 
from the coast of our North American possessions, a distance of nearly 3,000 
miles, was very unwelcome to travellers seeking pleasure. I was reminded of 
a song in which the following apt words occur: 



( 3 ) 


“ Oh what a row, what a rumpus and a rioting 

All those endure, you may be sure, that go to sea; 

A ship is a thing which you never can be quiet in, 

And whether it goes by steam or not, ’tis all the same to me.” 

The vast waves swept in rapid succession against the sides, stern, stem, 
and keel of the vessel, creating a series of frightful sounds and causing her to 
lurch in a manner very painful to the land lubbers, who, like myself, had never 
realized before the attempts to sleep on the seething waters of Biscay’s famous 
Bay. An occasional exchange of dishes took place at table,—Miss F. having 
Mrs W’s. soup suddenly heaved into her lap, and Mrs W. receiving a stew, 
dish, and condiments. Many miles from land, unable to sleep day or night 
for ninety-six hours; glasses, hampers, tumblers, basins, cast about the cabins, 
and a sensation of sickness and headache gave rise to many a vow from the 
passengers not to be seen again in such a position. 

August 11th. Pass Cape Finisterre and bid a long adieu to Biscay. Pass 
the Burlings, Cintra, Lisbon, St. Vincent, Trafalgar, Tariffa. The mountains 
of the Peninsula slope gradually down to the sea, presenting to the marine 
traveller an agreeable variety of creeks, bays, hills and valleys, and an ever 
varying richness of colours pleasing to the eye and indicative of the prolific 
powers of the soil. It is painful to reflect that here, where nature is so lavish 
of her bounties, human nature should do so little for its own comforts. But 
so it is : in Spain and Portugal, Italy, Turkey, Malta, and Hindostan, so 
little labour is required in the cultivation of the earth’s fruits, that indolence 
becomes a habit, the mind is left as uncultivated as the soil, and the absence of 
mental activity debases the nation and prepares it for any political adventurer 
sufficiently daring to enslave it. 

“ Poor paltry slaves ! yet born midst noble scenes, 

Why, Nature, waste thy wonders on such men ? ” 

CINTRA, 

A town in Estramadura in Portugal, is twelve miles N.w. of Lisbon, on the 
slope of the Sierra de Cintra, celebrated for its mild climate and delightful 
residences, the resort of the wealthy inhabitants of Lisbon during summer. 
The sovereigns of Portugal have a palace at Cintra, with fine gardens orna- 

b 2 


mented with numerous fountains and historical pictures. The country abounds 
with fruits in great variety, especially grapes, oranges, and lemons. There 
are several convents on the hills. Cintra is known as the seat of the Con¬ 
vention of 1808, after the defeat of Junot by the English at Yimiero. The 
population of the town is about 5,000. 

“ Lo ! Cintra*s glorious Eden intervenes, 

A variegated maze of mount and glen, 

Ah me ! what hand can pencil guide, or pen, 

To follow half on which the eye dilates, 

Thro’ views more dazzling unto mortal ken 
Thau those whereof such things the Bard relates, 

Who to the awe-struck world unlock’d Elysium’s gates ? ” 

Cape St. Vincent. Off this Cape a steamer is lying with damaged 
engines. We offer her assistance, but the captain refuses it unless we state 
the amount of expences he would incur. We cannot do so, and he declines 
our assistance at the risk of losing the ship. Passing 

GIBRALTAR. 

* 

August 12th. The rock is shaped like a Lion. Gibraltar, in Andalusia, is 
the most southernly province of Spain. English families inhabit the Rock 
and slopes, and the fortifications are considered impregnable while held by the 
English, except by starving the garrison, and this is not likely or possible 
while Britannia rules the waves. The population of Gibraltar is about 15,000, 
consisting of English, Jews, Spaniards, and Moors, and would be rapidly 
increased, but families are not allowed to settle there without giving security 
for good behaviour. Permis de sejour are issued by the Police Magistrate, 
for ten, fifteen, or twenty days, when, if the persons desire to continue their 
stay, the permis must be renewed. This rule is intended to keep down the 
population to a reasonable limit, as large numbers could not be supported 
there during a war. There is a strip of land, called the “ Neutral Ground,” 
between the English settlement and Spain, which entirely separates the two 
nations. The Rock of Gibraltar is the ancient Greek Calpe; on the African 
shore opposite is a mountain in Morocco called Abyla, and these two formed 


the celebrated pillars of Hercules, who is said to have rested with one foot on 
each, stretching over thirteen miles of sea. The Rock of Gibraltar is marble, 
and viewed from the sea appears devoid of verdure of any kind. It has, 
however, some wooded grassy glens in the nooks of the mountains. The 
asparagus, aloe, cactus, and other succulent plants grow on it, and Kelaart 
describes upwards of 400 indigenous flowering plants and ferns. It is 
inhabited also by rabbits, pigeons, partridges, and woodcocks, and is remarkable 
as the only spot in Europe where apes are found wild. To kill one of them is 
as great an offence as it was in ancient Egypt to kill the ibis^ and is now, 
in Holland, to injure a stork, and, in Turkey, to kill a cat, dog, or pigeon. 
They are, nevertheless, frequently snared and are fast disappearing. 

MEDITERRANEAN. 

Granada. 13th. Arose and found myself in the Mediterranean, by the 
coast of Granada. The mountains on this coast are very bold and high, tinted 
with the loveliest hues, ever varying as the summer sun in its course sheds its 
light on the hill tops, into the glens, or sparkles along the shore. The moun¬ 
tains of the Sierra Nevada would alone repay the tourist for a trip to the 
Mediterranean. They are over 11,000 feet high, extend for many miles along 
the coast, and while the sides are as verdant as a plantation, the tops are 
covered with perpetual snow—a great relief to the eye, when, with a tempera¬ 
ture of 92 in the shade, all other objects around are scorching hot. This 
scenery, from Malaga to Capa de Gata, wild, fertile, sublimely grand, prolific 
in fruits, gorgeous in aspect and charming in detail, is not equalled by any be¬ 
tween Liverpool, Constantinople and Marseilles. Along the line of coast the 
towers built as watch-towers and as defences against the Moors are still 
occupied by sentries, and each one has a drawbridge which is raised at night. 

15th. Having passed the Cape, no land is perceptible ; hut at this part of 
the Mediterranean the clear blue waters rippled by a gentle head wind, 
porpoises playing around the ship, and the little birds called “ Mother Carey's 
Chickens,” beautifully coloured under the breast and wings, following in 
the wake to feed on any surplus food the Lords of Creation may spare them; 
the sun and air as clear as could be desired or imagined ; nothing stirring 
around us but fishes and birds, and the spray caused by the passage of the 


steamer; whilst every one is elated by the charming transparent blue of the 
water—the tranquility, beauty and solitude by which we are surrounded, all 
conspire to contrast our present position favorably with the scenes we have just 
left in Old England, and compel us to acknowledge that the charms of nature 
have claims upon our admiration which the accumulated works of men can 
never command. Here general conversation ceases, and individual remarks in 
admiration of the beauties around succeed. The ladies crochet and the gentle¬ 
men smoke. The day is not long enough for us. After watching the sunset, 
which is very sudden in this latitude, (about 37 north,) the twinkling stars and 
the sweet silver moon; the milky-way crossing the expanse above our heads, 
like a belt of brilliants; the polar star brightly shining to the north and Sirius 
to the south, rivet us to the deck ’till far into the morning; when we retire to 
rest, to rise early and see the sun shed its effulgence on the waters around, and 
are well compensated by a sunrise so enchanting that any attempt to describe it 
would be futile. 


AFRICA. 

Algeria. Passed Algeria near enough to survey it with the naked eye. 
There is a good artificial harbour. The mountains on the coast are very high, 
very irregular, apparently fertile, and remains of the old Moorish walls around the 
city seem to be in pretty perfect condition. The native Algerians, whose terri¬ 
tory extended from Tunis on the east to Morocco on the west, were estimated 
at 2,000,000 in 1833; but being continually slaughtered or burnt in their caves 
by the “ civilized” French, the number may now be about one half. Algeria 
is subject to dry winds from four to five days successively, and very heavy 
rains in November and December. From July to October the surface of the 
soil is burnt by the sun, and, as in Malta, the reflection of the sun’s rays pro¬ 
duces ophthalmia. The country around is very fertile, and produces fruits of 
every kind, and a great number of flowers, among them a white rose, from 
which the “ attar of roses ’’ is extracted. Algiers and Morocco are the only 
countries of the merino sheep; scorpions and other venomous reptiles and 
insects abound in the country around, and locusts pay visits and eat and 
destroy the crops. When they have surfeited themselves, and become unable 
to fly away, the natives of the Atlas mountains return the compliment and 


eat the locusts. The beautiful Arabian horses and mules used in Malta to 
draw caleches, in Turkey to draw arabas and for riding, and in Sicily as 
carriage horses, are bred in this part of Africa. An alarming accident occurred 
about 2 a.m., when most of the passengers were asleep. A sound was heard 
as of a man struggling in the sea and calling for help. We were many miles 
from any land, and in the silence of night, surprised and terrified, ran upon 
deck, looked over the sides of the ship and obtained the assistance of the first 
mate, whose practised eye could discern nothing on the surface of the water. 
He thought it might be a passenger who had clandestinely come aboard, and 
secreted himself (as they sometimes do) in the hold among the luggage. All 
search was fruitless, and we returned to rest, or rather to our cabins, to talk 
over the matter, and Mr. W. prevented my sleeping by relating the details 
of two occasions when he had heard such sounds in the Pacific, and how each 
of them was followed by a death in his family within twenty-four hours. The 
subject was discussed at breakfast time, when it was explained that Miss 
F. had had a nightmare, and screamed so loudly as to wake her fellow pas¬ 
sengers. Passed Tunis and Cape Bon, and a group of small islands where 
the Sparta was wrecked, and still remains. There were 1000 persons on 
board, going to the Crimea—principally troops—fortunately they all succeeded 
in climbing the rocks and were saved. She is a fine steamer, quite new, and 
was wrecked in consequence of the carelessness of the captain, who, contrary 
to custom, steamed between the islands at night, instead of outside them, 
where there was plenty of sea-way. The captain and the first mate were tried 
for negligence, both dismissed the service, and the captain imprisoned. 

MALTA. 

August 17. Steamed into the harbour. The defences, built by the Knights 
of Malta, on the hills that surround the harbour, where hundreds of guns 
point in all directions seaward; the moat that surrounds the town in the 
rear bristling with cannons, and the draw-bridges across the road at each 
entrance from the surrounding country, render Malta the safest island in the 
Mediterranean as a garrison town, and cause it to be coveted by various nations 
as a naval station. The length of the island is about seventeen miles. Popu¬ 
lation 103,000 ; 4,500 only of them British. The town is built on hills which 


•surround the harbour. Its greatest height is about 600 feet above the level of 
the sea. The climate is fine and healthy, but subject to the sirocco and 
oppressively hot in summer, when no rain falls for months, and the pedestrian 
is liable to be covered with dust before he advances a mile from the town. 
Byron has immortalized the town in the following apostrophe: 

“ Adieu, ye joys of La Yallette ! 

Adieu, sirocco, sun and sweat! 

Adieu, thou palace rarely entered ! 

Adieu, ye mansions where—I’ve ventured ! 

Adieu, ye cursed streets of stairs ! 

(How surely he who mounts you swears !) 

Adieu, ye merchants often failing ! 

Adieu, thou mob for ever railing! 

Adieu, ye packets—without letters ! 

Adieu, ye fools—who ape your betters ! 

Adieu, thou damndest quarantine ! 

That gave me fever and the spleen ! 

* * * * 

Adieu, ye females fraught with graces ! 

Adieu, red coats aud redder faces ! 

Adieu, the supercilious air 
Of all who strut “ en militaire ! ” 

* * * * 

And now, O Malta ! since thou’st got us 
Thou little military hothouse ! 

I’ll not offend with words uncivil. 

And wish thee rudely to the devil, 

But only stare from out my casement, 

And ask for what is such a place meant ? ” 

Valetta is considered a well-built town. The houses are constructed of white 
stone, painful to the eyes. The streets leading from the harbour are mostly 
formed of steps, and rise gradually to the upper part of the town. There are 
some good promenades on the heights—the lower barracka and the upper 
barracka from which the views are very extensive, and Florian, a mile or 
more in the interior, a handsome garden promenade, with a variety of trees 
and flowers and seats covered with dust in the summer, but, no doubt, enchant¬ 
ing on a fine day after rain. There are a few monuments distributed over these 


( 9 ) 

promenades, neatly sculptured in Maltese marble. In all parts of the island the 
prickly pear, figs, melons, plums, and other fruits, grow and ripen naturally, but 
the natives living principally on fruit, a large quantity is imported annually from 
Sicily, a distance of 60 miles. The native Maltese are a lazy mean race ; rich 
and poor have the reputation of lying and indirect dealing. At Malta 
they were either begging or quarrelling, not working. During my travels 
I heard no one attribute to them any virtues whatever, and 17 days’ experience, 
if sutficient to rely on, confirms the character. The Maltese sailors on board 
the Teneriffe were very lazy, and a Maltese family, man, woman, boy and girl, 
who undertook to work their passage out, never worked unless compelled by the 
officers; add to these, a professional man, who travelled as cabin passenger, totally 
devoid of moral principle. They are beggars at Malta, robbers at Smyrna, 
Constantinople and the Levant ; but in Greece, the natives being too cunning for 
the Maltese, they become industrious from necessity, labour hard, and make good 
citizens. About one tenth of the population appears to be Roman Catholic 
priests, whose daily visitations wring from the poorest some portion of their 
earnings. At the corners of the streets effigies of dead bishops cut in white 
stone pray for the people, and among the populace living priests clad in black 
stoles prey on the people; natives at church, kneeling at the altars at St. J ohn’s 
Cathedral, not poor in appearance, rise upon the entrance of a foreigner and beg 
to become his guide. They quarrel like fishwomen, talking and vociferating 
and threatening in a patois intended for Italian, the common language of the 
island, but want the courage to strike, unless the quarrel becomes so 
fierce as to cause them to draw a dagger or clasp knife which every Maltese 
carries. The lower orders sleep in the streets in summer—lying about the 
pavement and the horse road, and are consequently always ready to carry a 
parcel, fetch a caleche, or assist any ship that may enter the harbour. The 
Maltese proverb says, “ a Maltese may live on fish, flesh and fowl for a half¬ 
penny a day.” Went to St. John’s Cathedral; a fine specimen of architecture. 
One of the altars is fenced round with silver railings ; when the French took 
the town, to check their rapacity, these railings were painted to disguise them. 
The floor is a mosaic pavement of sepulchral monuments of the Knights, whose 
effigies in full costume are of white marble. The arms of all the Grand Mas¬ 
ters are inlaid in various colored marbles. This Cathedral was formerly cele- 

c 


( 10 ) 


brated for the riches of its treasury, but it was completely plundered by 
Napoleon. The Palace of the Grand Masters, now the residence of the British 
Governor, contains several magnificent halls and an armoury, numerous medi¬ 
ocre pictures, and some good tapestries. The Palace is very neatly finished, 
very simple in style, and large enough to allow the family to divide it into a 
winter and a summer residence. Visitors are shewn over it upon making 
an application at any convenient time. 

Had beautiful Ices at a well-conducted Cafe, for which only l|d. each glass 
was charged. That these Ices are snow brought from Mount Etna, seems 
paradoxical; but so it is. 

Supped with a family, fellow passengers, at an hotel. The food was served 
exactly as in France; indeed the French cuisine appears to be adopted all 
over the Continent. 

August 18. Bose and hired a boat, with Mr. W., with a clean white 
awnnig, for a sun shade, and a fantastically carved prow, and jumped from 
the boat into the clear blue water in the harbour to bathe. Breakfasted 
and went into the town. 

Gozzo, the famed Island of Calypso, where St. Paul is said to have been 
wrecked, is five miles from Malta, and passenger boats constantly pass to 
and from it. A small handsome yacht is let out for the passage to those 
who can manage it, and rowing boats to others. At Gozzo 

“ Where neither lake nor river glads the eye 
Seared with the glare of hot and copper sky,” 

the water for the entire population is kept in one tank and is the chief care 
of the authorities. Mrs. Captain T. left the ship for this Island, whose aspect 
from the sea is so very barren that the other passengers expressed strong 
compassion for her. But there is some vegetation to be seen in the winter 
and the spring, and fruits are grown with as little labour as in the neighbouring 
Island of Malta. Purchased a beautiful large bunch of grapes, eighteen 
prickly pears, and a fine melon, for elevenpence. Prickly pears are a luxury 
among the poor Maltese, who skilfully peel them; but persons not familiar 
with them are apt to find them very troublesome, the prickles entering the 
skin of the hands and lips, and, in our case, covering the cushion of the 
cabin where they were deposited, and rendering it remarkably unpleasant 








( 11 ) 


to sit upon ; we had them thrown overboard. A passenger who had bought 
some and distributed them in his pockets was about as happy as if he had 
had all his clothes turned into pincushions, and could obtain no relief until 
the pockets were all cut away. 

The Maltese specimens of art are best shown in their muslins, plain and 
embroidered, which they sell at a very low price; their beautiful filagree 
silver work, unequalled in any part of the world; the vault of the nave of 
St. John’s Cathedral, the rich mosaic pavements on the floor, and the tapestries 
in the palace, now the residence of the British governor, before referred to. 
The architecture of the hotels, the upper and lower barracka and florian, 
the barracks and other buildings, are chaste, but neither elaborate nor grand. 
The streets are irregular and for the most part poverty-stricken, and the 
caleche or carriage in general use, with a fine but ill-fed Arabian horse 
before and a pair of wheels behind , is very awkward and ill-contrived. The 
town of Malta is very like a second-rate French coast town, with the blocks 
of houses all crammed together, and beyond all open country, where nature is 
scarcely assisted by man in producing food and flowers. One thing strikes 
the traveller as very injudicious, viz : the clothing of the women. With a 
broiling sun at the highest temperature in the south, they wear a long 
cloak and hood of heavy black material, covering the head and face, with 
but just enough space left to enable them to ogle right or left as fancy may 
dictate. Leaving Malta at noon, the town and fortifications which surround 
it, houses and trees intermixed and gradually rising from the level of the 
harbour to a considerable height, encompassed by the clear blue water of the 
Mediterranean, form a charming scene for the delighted eye of the traveller 
who is to see no more land for 500 miles. 

ARABS. 

Among the passengers taken on board at Malta were three Arabians, 
supposed to be merchants. They were carefully dressed in the picturesque 
Turkish costume, were deck passengers, and slept in the open air. It is 
a rule among Mahomedans in travelling by sea to sleep on deck, as they 
are accustomed in Asia to sleep in tents, and to carry their food with them. 
The three accompanying us brought grapes, nuts, raisins, melons, bread and 

c 2 


( 12 ) 


bedding, requiring from the ship’s provisions nothing but water. They were 
generous to the children on board, and offered a portion of their food to all the 
passengers who noticed them. They prayed alternately in a subdued voice, 
three or four times a day, with the face to the east, performing many genuflex¬ 
ions, bending, bowing and touching the ground with their foreheads. They lay 
on their beds day and night, taking no exercise, and seldom leaving, except for 
the performance of their religious rites, and to eat and drink. 

GREECE. 

Cape Matapan. Passed by Cape Matapan in the Morea, about 60 miles 
from Sparta, once the terror of the world, but now celebrated for nothing but its 
unimportance, a powerful illustration of the rise and fall of nations. 

Cerigo. The Island of Cerigo on the right, and Cape St. Angelo on the left. 
Cerigo is one of the seven Ionian Islands, and about 13 miles south of the Morea, 
rocky and mountainous, better stocked with cattle than any other of the Ionian 
Islands, and produces grapes, oil, cotton, lemons, oranges and corn. In this 
island are the remains of a celebrated temple dedicated to Venus, who is fabled 
to have leapt from the sea a perfect Goddess. During the Peloponnesian war it 
was taken by the Athenians, who carried off all the inhabitants, and ’tis now in 
the hands of the English and garrisoned by English troops. 

Isles of Greece. These celebrated isles appear very barren on the sides 
next the sea,but they all produce grapes,lemons,melons, oranges and corn in small 
quantities. Their most beautiful feature is the light transparent clouds over the 
tops of the mountains, extending miles, and slowly moving along the coast, 
never passing away over the sea, but like living creatures clinging to the land 
of their birth until the sun which gave them form disperses them at noon, to take 
a new shape next day. 

Syr a. August 21st. At midnight. Nearing Syra, we slacken speed to 
enable us to enter the harbour at daybreak. Syra, an island in the Archi¬ 
pelago, shaped like a double tooth, the two prongs forming a good harbour, 
is surrounded by the Grecian Isles, Milo, Anti-Milo, Thermia, Zea, Andros, 
Zenos, Naxos, Paros, Delos, and several others, all celebrated more or less 
for the part they played in the struggle between Athens and Sparta, and 
subsequently between Greece and Asia. They are not important at the 


( 13 ) 


present time, having very little trade, and celebrated only for the degeneracy 
of their populations: 

“ The Isles of Greece, the Isles of Greece! 

Where burning Sappho loved and sung. 

Where grew the arts of war and peace,— 

Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung! 

Eternal summer gilds them yet. 

But all, except their sun, is set.” 

The Greeks inhabiting these islands are remarkable for a careless dirty ex¬ 
terior, wear a petticoat sewed at the lower part, leaving two holes for the legs to 
pass through, (a bad imitation of the Mussulman dress), and consequently their 
walking has much the appearance of the marching of geese upon a common. 
A dirty colored flannel shirt and a greasy scull-cap or a fez on their heads, and 
stockings and shoes very large and loose, complete the dress. Our stay at Syra 
was not intended to last more than six hours, having very little merchandize, 
principally iron, to deliver. The doctor came on board and found we had a 
clean bill of health from Malta. He nevertheless put us in Quarantine and 
said we might have pratique next morning. A guardiamo was sent aboard to 
prevent our having any communication with the residents, as we were in quaran¬ 
tine. We were allowed to go in his company by boat to the custom-house, 
where our letters and dispatches were exchanged by the aid of tongs to prevent 
contagion being introduced into the islands. Went on shore with the captain, 
my chum, another passenger and the guardiamo, and chatted with the custom¬ 
house officers and assistants. Any one having contact with a person in quaran¬ 
tine is forthwith sent to the lazaretto to prevent the possibility of his carrying 
contagion into the town. Forgetting sometimes the quarantine, we approached 
the natives, who immediately commenced a sort of quadrille, which we thought 
was intended for our amusement, but were informed that the extraordinary 
movements were made merely to avoid us. Twenty labourers, principally Greeks, 
who came on board to unload were sent after finishing their work to the lazaretto 
till next day. Syra is an oddly constructed town. The houses (like those of 
Malta) are built of white stone, one above the other, on the steep hills around 
the harbour. The Roman Catholic district is quite distinct from the Greek 
colony, high on the hills behind it. The houses are mostly detached, and look, 
even from the harbour, like toy houses built with cards. The Syrans have of 


( 14 ) 


late taken to ship building, and have several small vessels on the stocks, and 
orders from neighbouring isles. England supplies them with sheet iron, blocks, 
screws, nails and other materials. Went with Mr. W. and the captain to bathe 
in the harbour, the guardiamo always accompanying us. We presented a rather 
odd appearance, the captain having forgotten to remove his neck-tie, and I 
having dived in with my flannel on. On one side of the harbour of Syra there 
is a remarkable phenomenon—a brook running down from the hills has formed 
a channel across the beach, and ships run into this channel and left for two or 
three days, have their bottoms cleaned as free from fish, shells, weeds and rust 
as if they had been cleaned by hand in a dry dock. 

Greek Passengers. Several Greeks took passages from Syra to Con¬ 
stantinople, all as deck passengers, although some of them, in good circum¬ 
stances, made attempts to mix with the cabin passengers, wishing to have the 
best accommodation for the smallest fare ; and one, quite a Greek dandy, in the 
attire of the last mode francaise , with a servant, entered our cabin at dinner 
time, and would have taken a seat, but was ordered on deck by the captain. 
Most of these Greeks are travelling east to seek employment. Mahomedans, 
however poor, are too proud to engage in any domestic service : hence the 
temporary exodus of the subjects of Otho and the Greek Islands. They leave 
their native places for a few years, obtain employment as domestic servants and 
spies in European Turkey, and return to their homes to trade with the wages 
they have earned. The majority of these servile Greeks are males, and though 
their wages are high, they are very bad servants—rude, uncivil, morose, hating 
their Turkish or Christian employers, and frequently absenting themselves from 
their duties. This is one of the greatest social evils of Turkey, for these Greek 
servants are ever ready to give to their countrymen full descriptions of the pro¬ 
perty of their employers, and frequent robbery is the result, not always 
unaccompanied by violence. A family at Galata has, at the present time, a 
Greek domestic who carries a large dagger, and boasts that he has plunged it 
into the hearts of several of his employers and other persons, and offers to use 
it at any time in defence of the ladies he is now with. Although he has for some 
years been faithful to them, he does exactly as he pleases, and is most likely to 
remain in his present service, notwithstanding the dislike felt for him, as long 
as he thinks proper, as the wages paid to him are in the nature of a bribe to 
prevent violence. 


( 15 ) 


HERMIT. 

The coast of Thermia is barren, rocky, steep and mountainous, and at the 
foot of the eastern side, far away from any other human being, lives a 
hermit in a fantastic grotto, built of white stone and divided into com¬ 
partments, presenting externally the appearance of a small palace without 
architectural beauty or regularity. The only way he has of communicating 
with human beings is by a long path which extends from near the grotto along 
the slopes of the steep mountain, and every expedition for food or other 
necessities is a long and laborious pilgrimage. In winter a ship’s boat does 
sometimes put into one of the creeks wdth food, but this cannot be done except 
when the sea is quite calm. This modern Diogenes reminds one of Epictetus, 
a celebrated stoic philosopher, a man of remarkable fortitude and equanimity, 
born in the first century of our era, who is said by Origen to have dwelt alone in 
a miserable hut without any furniture, except a bed and a lamp; but afterwards, 
for the sake of a poor foundling he had taken home, he was induced to hire an 
attendant. Epictetus was at one period of his life the slave of Epaphroditus, 
who amused himself one day by twisting his leg. Epictetus mildly warned 
him that he would break it, and when it was actually broken by violence, the 
youthful stoic calmly remarked, “ Did I not tell you you would do so 

ASIA MINOR. 

Smyrna. From Syra the ship’s course was by Tenos, the boundary Island 
of the Archipelago of Greece, through the strait between Chios and the Cape 
of Smyrna in Asia Minor. This part of Asia Minor is the site of ancient 
Troy. Along the shore are numerous tumuli, supposed to be the “ general 
tomb ” of the Greeks who fell in the savage encounters during the siege of 
Troy : 

“ In mingled throngs the Greek and Trojan train 
Thro’ heaps of carnage search the mournful plain, 

Scarce could the friend his slaughtered friend explore, 

With dust dishonored and deformed with gore. 

The wounds they washed, their pious tears they shed, 

And laid along their cars deplored the dead, 

. . . . with silent haste 

The bodies decent on the piles were placed 


( 16 ) 


The cold remains consume with equal care, 

And slowly, sadly, to their fleet repair. 

Now ere the morn had streaked with red ’ning light. 

The doubtful confines of the day and night, 

About the dying flames the Greeks appeared 
And round the pile a general tomb they reared! ” 

After nearly forty-eight hours in the Archipelago, while not a breeze stirred 
the sails, nor a plant relieved the eye from the glaring sun, the arid rocks, and 
the still bright waters, the voyager can rest his delighted eyes on the verdant 
plains of Smyrna and almost envy the turhaned Turks its possession. Trees, 
plants, fruits, flowers, birds, and beasts abound, and nature has lavishly 
prepared for all the necessities of animal life. Labour is not required to 
enable man to subsist, as the land produces a superabundance, and the surplus 
is sent annually overland, on the backs of camels, to the Gulf of Smyrna, to be 
shipped to other less favored lands, England receiving a large proportion. 

Smyrna Harbour. “ Several natural phenomena confer on this harbour 
peculiarities not elsewhere observed. Sometimes the power of refraction is so 
great as altogether to change the aspect of distant objects : ships sailing up, see 
the city as it were just under their bows, when it suddenly disappears; and 
when it is again perceptible, it is on the distant horizon. From the constant 
action of the sun on the air, at the extreme end of the harbour, where it is 
encircled by an amphitheatre of high hills, a considerable degree of rarefaction 
takes place, and the heated air ascending leaves a vacuum below into which 
the colder rushes. This constant and regular trade-wind is peculiarly favorable 
to the commerce of the port, as ships are wafted by it to their stations with the 
unerring certainty of steamboats. 

“ In the year 1402 Tamerlane besieged the city, and, in order to prevent 
all communication by sea, he ordered every soldier to take a stone in his hand 
and drop it in the mouth of the harbour. By this he hoped not only to keep 
out their allies, but to shut in all who would attempt to escape. The ships in 
the harbour passed over the mound before it was sufficiently high to obstruct 
their passage; and the disappointed barbarian caused a thousand prisoners to 
be decapitated, and with their heads, mixed with stones, erected a tower near 
the spot to commemorate his attempt.” 

Birthplace of Homer. This Town, the “ Queen of the Cities of 



( 17 ) 


Anatolia,'’ is supposed to be the birthplace of Homer. It has been ten times 
destroyed by war, and uniformly risen from its ruins with greater splendour. 
The population is about 140,000, above one half of them Turks and the 
remainder Greeks, Jews, Armenians, and Franks. Each nation is protected 
by its own consul and has a distinct quarter of the town to live in. This 
custom of location of races appears to prevail in all the cities of Turkey and 
Greece. 

Among the hills of Smyrna, not far from the town, there is a powerful band 
of Greek brigands who divide themselves into small detachments for plunder, 
and waylay travellers, who are without escort, rob and ’ ill-treat, and not unfre- 
quently murder them that they may tell no tales; others are detained, and 
messages sent to their friends offering liberty on receipt of a ransom of ten, 
twenty, or thirty thousand piastres. These Greek bandits have relatives who 
are servants to families in surrounding districts, and obtain information of their 
intended movements. In the year 1855 a party of sportsmen left Smyrna in 
search of the robbers, determined to attack, and, if possible, capture some. 
They did not find them; but one of the party strayed from his friends and he 
was captured, ill-treated, and had to be ransomed by a heavy payment. 

Passing Mitylene, —and Tenedos, an Island famous for the bad wine 
supplied to the allied armies during the war,—and keeping our course along 
Besica Bay, where the British fleet proudly floated in 1854, we enter the 

DARDANELLES. 

The coast along each side is very beautiful, prolific in trees, meadows, 
hill, and dale, and dotted with villages and handsome country residences. The 
Turks forbid any vessels to enter the Dardanelles between sunset and sunrise, 
and numbers of stone forts, built along both shores, well supplied with 
mounted guns and heavy stone shot, which being fired into a ship break 
on the deck into little bits, like English shells, and deal destruction around, 
enforce the prohibition. The bays on both banks afford good anchorage for 
shipping and form natural harbours in which vessels of heavy tonage ride secure. 
About half way through the strait we are opposite the celebrated scenes of 

Leander’s exploits. This chivalrous youth is supposed to have swam 

frequently from Sestos, on the European side of the Hellespont (Dardanelles) 

D 


( 18 ) 


to Abydos, on the Asiatic side, to see his charming mistress Hero. The 
waters of the Hellespont are sometimes very rough, and from Sestos to Abydos 
is about three miles across. The stream always runs one way, from the Black 
Sea to the Grecian Archipelago, and Leander, therefore, had to swim evening 
and morning about four or five miles. Our contemporaries are divided in 
opinion as to the truth of the romantic account of this daring lover. The whole 
account may be merely poetic and originated by Musoeus in the fourth century, 
whose poem of “ The Love and Tragical Fate of Leander” is still extant. At 
various times bridges of boats have connected both sides of the Hellespont, at 
a point between Sestos and Abydos, which is not much more than a mile across. 
The army of Xerxes crossed here, b.c. 480, by a bridge of boats w T hich 
remained a long time: for, nearly half a century afterwards, it is described 
by Herodotus who was on the spot. Darius, his father, on his Scythian 
expedition, had also crossed the channel of Constantinople on a bridge of boats : 
and so did the army of Alexander, b.c. 334, when he and his friend Hephoestion 
did honour to the mounds that were said to contain the remains of Achilles 
and Patroclus; and as the sea of Marmora and the Bosphorus are very wide 
and frequently very stormy, the Hellespont is the only practicable passage for 
such a purpose. Leander, therefore, may have passed over the bridge of boats 
instead of repeatedly swimming. The truth of the poem of Musoeus is, 
however, strengthened by the building called The Tower of Hero, constructed 
at Abydos, at the commencement of our era, and by a romantic tower nearly 
midway between The Golden Horn and Scutari, called Leander’s Tower, built 
in the fourth century by Constantine and now extant. We also know that 
Byron swam from Sestos to Abydos, although he calls the account of Leander’s 
feats “ the doubtful story.” 

“ If, in the month of dark December, 

Leander, who was nightly wont 
(What maid will not the tale remember ?) 

To cross thy stream, broad Hellespont: 

Tf, when the wintry Tempest roared, 

He sped to Hero, nothing loth, 

And thus of old thy current pour’d,— 

Fair Venus ! how I pity both ! 

For me, degenerate modern wretch, 




( 19 ) 


Tho’ in the genial month of May, 

My dripping limbs I faintly stretch. 

And think I’ve done a feat to day. 

But since he crossed the rapid tide. 

According to the doubtful story, 

To woo—and—Lord knows what beside 
And swam for Love, as I for Glory ; 

’Twere hard to say who fared the best: 

Sad mortals ! thus the Gods still plague you. 

He lost his labor, I my jest: 

For he was drown’d, and I’ve the ague.” 

Byron. May 9, 1810. 

Gallipoli. August 22nd. 4 p.m. We are opposite Gallipoli, at which the 
passengers have been staring, for an hour or two, through their glasses. The 
stream is rather strong against us; but a refreshing breeze, the first that has 
greeted us from Malta hither, cools the brow and enables us to breathe freely. 
This little peninsula town is built on the margin of one of the bays, so numerous 
along both sides of this coast, and is rather picturesque, many of the houses 
being built of white stone, and all interspersed with an abundance of trees and 
plants. The town is apparently very poor and dirty, has very little trade, and, 
until the recent war brought it into notice, was never of any consequence. 
Gallipoli was the first Greek town taken by the Ottomans (1357) when the 
Emperor John Palaeologus said : he had “ only lost a jar of wine and a sty for 
hogs,” in allusion to the magazines and cellars built by Justinian. On the 
south side of the city are Tumuli, said to be the sepulchres of the ancient 
Thracian Kings ; and north-east of the town are some ruins supposed to be the 
remains of the ancient city. 

THE SEA OF MARMORA, OR PROPONTIS. 

Steaming along the Sea of Marmora, with the breeze and the stream 
still against us, and making but little way; pass the Island of Marmora at 
midnight, having sighted it two hours before. Approach the 

Princess Islands, anciently called the Demon Islands, and said to have 
been haunted by foul spirits, but now called Princess Islands from a royal lady 
taking snelter there from her pursuer. They consist of a group of nine 

d 2 


( 20 ) 


Islands between Kadikoi in Asia and the Bay near Mount Olympus, on one 
of which (Kalki) are three hills and three convents. One of these convents is 
now a college in which ancient and modern Greek, French, writing and arith¬ 
metic are taught to about sixty students, all Greeks. The Islands are the 
favorite resort of the wealthy from Constantinople, who go by steamer in the 
afternoon and stay till next day, when the steamer brings them back to Galata 
Bridge. The wind has abated and the Sea of Marmora is as calm as the 
Thames at Twickenham. Day is breaking. The passengers of the good ship 
Teneriffe leave their cabins and are charmed by the most gorgeous sunrise their 
eyes ever beheld. Cloud upon cloud in the horizon, tinged with the most 
delicate colors, emerge, roll away, and are succeeded by other groups of clouds, 
each in its turn softening the lustre of the God of Day; a few minutes more, 
he rises above them all, and fills the space above and around with a glory that 
makes one wonder how man can cram his fancy with priest-made Deities, while 
Nature presents him daily such a shrine to worship at. When the admiring 
eyes have feasted on this matchless scene, they are attracted by a number 
of glittering spires, the gilt minarets that decorate the mosques of the city of 
the Sultan. A few minutes more and we approach the western extremity of 
this favored place, extending along the margin of the sea nearly ten miles. 

CONSTANTINOPLE, 

Built on seven hills, rising one above another to a considerable height, the 

% 

houses surrounded by cypress trees, plane trees, and mosques interspersed along- 
the whole line, with the Sultan’s palaces and numerous forts along the coast, 
and high towers on the hills, presents a magnificent coup d’ceil. 

“ Sprinkled with palaces ; the ocean stream 
Here and there studded with a seventy four : 

Sophia’s cupola with golden gleam ; 

The cypress groves ; Olympus high and hoar ; 

The twelve Isles, and the more than I could dream. 

Far less describe.” 

“ This wonderful city, (says Miss Pardoe), seen from the Sea of Marmora, 
is as singular as it is beautiful. The wall by which it is enclosed is separated 
from the water only by a narrow wharf or terrace, pierced at intervals by 










( 21 ) 


a close lattice-work, through which the fair tenants can look out upon the sun- 
lighted waves, and on to the fantastic islands of the Propontis: in some places 
overgrown by the most luxuriant parasites, among which are conspicuous the 
rich dark leaves of the ivy, and the clustering verdure of the gorgeous caper 
plant, with its galaxy of blossoms ; and, in others, surmounted by a light and 
graceful kiosque, now tarnished by the weather and mouldering in disuse.” 

This enchanting city has been subjected to many chances and changes. 
Byzantium, the present Seraglio point, built by the Megarians, b.c. 667, was 
fiercely contested by Persians, Spartans, and Athenians ; taken by the Homans 
before the Christian Era; made the seat of Empire by Constantine, a.d. 330 ; 
attacked four separate times by the Russians in 865, 904, 941, and 1043; in 
1204 taken and pillaged by the Crusaders; recovered by the Greeks in 1261 ; 
and finally captured by Mahmoud in 1453. The Greeks intend storming it 
in about fourteen years, when they hope to drive out the Osmanlis and re¬ 
establish the Greek Empire. Although the whole of European Turkey is 
called Constantinople, Stamboul alone forms Constantinople proper, and is the 
Turkish City. 

The Hippodrome, near Saint Sophia, is a large quadrangular Court, 250 
paces long and 150 broad, in which four remarkable columns are placed: one 
of marble brought from Egypt, a second of marble brought from Delphos, a 
third of bronze, and a fourth called the Burnt Column of porphyry. The marble 
column brought from Egypt by the Greeks is of Thebaic stone, a four cornered 
pyramid* of one single piece, about fifty feet high', covered on the sides by 
hieroglyphics. The machines used in raising it are represented in bas-relief. 
Nicetas observes that on its top there was placed a brazen pine-apple, which 
was thrown down by an earthquake. The second obelisk, which is broader, 
is formed of square pieces of marble, and was once completely covered with 
brazen plates. The top has fallen off, and the remainder amazes one by 
retaining its position, being kept together by the weight only of the pieces 
resting on each other. Its base is marble, and about fifteen feet square. The 
third is a very curious spiral column, cast in bronze, and originally terminated 

* This pyramid is much larger than the one brought to France by Napoleon, and now standing 
in the Place de la Concorde, Paris, and which, in imitation of the one at the Hippodrome, has on 
its sides representations of the machine used in raising it. 







( 22 ) 


in the heads of three serpents, which were broken away at different periods. 
The fourth, called the Burnt Column, from its being smoke-dried and charred 
by the numerous accidental fires in the vicinity, is formed of pieces of porphyry 
held together by copper fastenings, and report says that, for many generations, 
Constantine’s statue rested on its top. 

Aqueducts.* The Aqueduct of Pyrgos, near Constantinople, forms a portion 
of the extensive solid hydraulic works with which that capital was supplied 
with water after it became the seat of Empire. It is remarkable in design and 
execution, and considered a fair specimen of the style of such structures by the 
Homans in the middle ages ; formed of two branches composed of three rows 
of arches, and in some places eighty feet high, it conveys water from the 
Yalley of Belgrade, a distance of fifteen miles, to several parts of the Imperial 
City. Part of this aqueduct is attributed to Justinian, and part to the 
Turks. In Constantinople there are immense subterraneous “ cisterns,” into 
which a considerable quantity of the water is conducted by branch pipes. 
Some of these cisterns have the roof supported by numerous marble columns, 
one of them alone, now partly dry, sustained by one hundred and eleven 
such columns, is used by Armenians as a spinning-ground. This cistern, 
seen from the top of the stair-way through an atmosphere always damp and 
never brighter than twilight, youthful spinners moving about between the 
columns like Londoners on a foggy night, the distant sounds of the busy 
spinning-wheels and the faint echoes of the distant voices, remind one of 
the shades of the ancients, where the dead walked about perceptible to the 
sight, but not to the touch. . 

The Bazaars are narrow roofed streets, some miles in length, built with 
irregularity, in which the daily transactions range from a pennyworth of 


* These channels for conveying water have existed during all recorded ages. Solomon erected 
one that conveyed water from the pools and fountains near Bethlehem to Jerusalem, and the Romans 
built many of them very extensive and handsome, one alone bringing water into the city from 
a distance of sixty miles to supply fish-ponds, baths, private bouses and artificial lakes ; and nine 
of these aqueducts delivering daily into the city twenty-eight millions of cubic feet of water. The 
Maintenon Aqueduct Bridge that supplies Versailles with water is nearly one mile long. An 
extensive one in India distributes the water of the Ganges through the north-west provinces 
of Bengal. The Croton Aqueduct, that supplies the city of New York with water, is considered 
the most magnificent erected in modem times. One at Edinburgh conducts the water from a 
distance of seven miles into the city. 











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( 23 ) 


tobacco to a jewelled ring, watch, or necklace valued at thousands of pounds. 
Each trade has a separate bazaar or street. They are crowded by men, women, 
horses, mules, arabas, in the greatest confusion. There is no particular place 
for either of them to journey on, neither right side nor wrong; and any pas¬ 
senger is liable to be jostled by any other, or to have a horse tread on his toes, 
a wheel pass over his foot, or a hamel (porter) thrust him on one side to make 
room for a bale of goods or a barrel of water. A visit to these bazaars greatly 
disappoints an European, who having an idea that Burlington Arcade, Lowther 
Bazaar, and the passages of the Palais Royal were but poor imitations of the 
Turkish Bazaars, find, that although the merchandize in some of them is rich 
and costly, the roadways are dirty, narrow, ill-paved, and provokingly incon¬ 
venient. But the manner of trading strikes the stranger as the most remarkable 
feature in these bazaars. 

Turkish Traders. The happy inactive Turk, sitting with folded legs on 
a soft cushion surrounded by his wares, devotes himself to smoking the Tchi- 
bouque, which he believes his principal duty on this earth, and only to be 
disturbed or varied by his attendance at the mosque and obesiances to the sun in 
its career between rising and setting. With the Tchibouque he whiles away the 
time, occasionally sipping a very small cup of coffee, almost as strong as brandy, 
and willing but not anxious to sell his merchandize. When asked about any 
article for sale, he considers that a direct answer satisfies the enquiry, and it is 
not until a direct demand to shew the goods is made that he takes the trouble 
to rise from his seat, pull several times at the Tchibouque to prevent its going 
out, and then deliberately places it in a forward position that he may smoke 
again in happy oblivion as soon as the troublesome customer will allow him. 
Meanwhile the purchaser has been seen by others, and 

The Jew, the Persian, the Greek and Armenian traders make an attack 
upon him, like wolves upon a lamb,—each with some tempting article of per¬ 
sonal adornment; and few are the chances in favor of an Englishman’s escape 
without making a purchase. One Armenian shews about a dozen rings on his 
fingers, for one of which he asks 6000 piastres, (,£48.,) and a Maltese draws 
from his pocket a gold watch, which he informs the stranger was stolen last 
week, and can therefore be sold for a few pounds. 

The kindly disposition of the Turk is well illustrated here, for not- 



( 24 ) 


withstanding the want of space and the consequent loss of time in passing 
through the bazaars, hundreds of dogs are allowed to lie about, undisturbed 
except by an occasional sly blow from some Greek, or a kick from one of the 
Arabian ponies constantly traversing the crowded ways. Pigeons also in great 
numbers fly about Stamboul, supported by the Turks; they wander where they 
like, about the markets, on the tops of the fountains, through the bazaars, 2000 
of them having held possession, generation after generation, of one of the 
mosques. This kindness is shewn also in the Ottoman care of their poor—for 
whom no workhouse is provided, hut like the English, before the poor law 
enacted in Elizabeth’s time, every Turk considers it a duty to give alms to the 
aged and the poor ; some sitting by the way-side, and others calling at the 
residences and country houses at which they are sure to obtain relief. One 
is surprised to see, for the first time, 

Money Changers at Constantinople, and in all the villages along the 
Bosphorus; poor men with hands full, and rich men with heaps of coin and 
Turkish bank notes, sit about for the accommodation of persons who require 
change. These money-changers are Armenians and Jews. They give the full 
change without deduction. They are as acute as the three American boys, who 
were locked up in a room together, and by swopping their clothes realized 50 
dollars each; for although the customer is charged nothing for the trouble, the 
traders make large fortunes by the exchange. The principal moneys cir¬ 
culated in Turkey are the Turkish Lire, valued about 18s., Turkish Bank 
Notes, value Is. 8d. and upwards, and the Piastre, about one fifth of a shilling, 
half Piastre and quarter Piastre, and the Para, one-fifth part of a farthing. There 
is also a vast mixture of foreign copper coins, French, Austrian, German. 
English money is also taken freely by those who understand it; and Turks, who 
do not know the exact value of an English coin, readily trust to the Englishman 
to explain it to them. 

August 24. Rowed in the captain’s gig in the 

GOLDEN HORN, 

So called from its being shaped like an ox’s horn, the principal port in 
Turkey. Hundreds of the largest ships ride here with safety. The length 
of the harbour is about six miles. On both sides, as at the end of the 


( 25 ) 


bay, hills rise from the water’s edge to a considerable height, and the water is 
deep enough close to the shore for ships at anchor to have their prows resting 
upon the landing places. Elegant swift boats called 

Caiques flit about with great celerity, many of them gorgeously decorated, 
some carrying captains of Turkish vessels, or Pashas, rowed by 10 men, some 
with workmen going from or to Asia where they have employment, others with 
Turkish Ladies wearing the yakmash or veil tied round the head and face 
to conceal their beauty from the vulgar gaze, and attended by negro guards. 
Upon seeing these veiled ladies for the first time the untutored mind is struck 
with wonder that such a practice should prevail, but ’tis a part of the law in 
Turkey, that all the female subjects of the Sultan should in public hide their 
faces so that the eyes and the upper part of the nose only can be seen. The 
folly of the practice is shewn when one sees the eyes and nose of a negress peep¬ 
ing through, or a haggard shrunken woman, who exposes her legs to the knee, 
and yet covers the greater part of her face, which the meanest beggar might 
gaze on without the risk of being smitten. Turkish women of the poorer order 
wear a thick veil over their faces, while their necks and legs are frequently 
bare ; but those in easy circumstances wear a veil so fine and thin that their 
beautiful faces are easily seen through its transparency. The Golden Horn is 
to Constantinople what the Thames above-bridge is to London. On the 
Turkish Sabbath (Friday) the population is seen in boats, and arabas, on 
ponies, and on foot, wending their way to the 

Sweet Waters of Europe, as Londoners go on a fine Sunday to Kew and 
Richmond. These Sweet Waters remind one of Twickenham. The bright sun¬ 
shine, the grassy knolls, the gently sloping hills, the tall plane trees and the 
rippling stream which 

“ In the leafy month of June 
To the quiet woods all night, 

Singeth a pleasant tune,” 

combine with the gay dresses, the happy faces, the simple amusements, and a 
climate soft as luxury could desire, to make an elysium for the resort of the 
ease-loving Turks. 

Turkish Forces. Anchored in the Golden Horn are five large ships manned 
by sturdy sailors, many of whom are singing or playing an unmelodious tune on 

E 


( 26 ) 


a fife. But little discipline is shewn among the Turkish forces, either on land 
or at sea ; those on guard lodge their muskets on their shoulders at a right 
angle to their bodies while they smoke a cigarette, and place it against the wall 
to enjoy a few grapes, or a slice of melon. 

My first Tchibouque. Landed near the quarter of the Jews, and entered 
an old fashioned Turkish divan, very poor, ill-furnished, the interior surrounded 
by long cushioned benches, and the front open next the river. Tis kept by an 
old Turk, who has a boy with a slight knowledge of the French and 
Italian languages to attend on foreigners. After doubling our legs under 
us, in true oriental style, a Tchibouque was handed to each, filled with fine 
Turkish tobacco and accompanied by a cup of coffee. The cup was not larger 
than the smallest dram glass used in England, hut the coffee so strong that 
a quarter of a pint of water added to it would not have destroyed the flavor. 
The cup was too small to pour water into ; we therefore drank some from 
the glass placed on each of our trays, for in Turkey, as in Malta, Greece, Sicily, 
and France, no refreshment is served unaccompanied by a glass of water, 
which in summer is always welcome, and the natives, who drink the water 
before the coffee, recognize foreigners by their drinking the coffee first and 
the water afterwards. The Turks have built 

Three Bridges across the Golden Horn, one of them remarkably neat 
and well built, and another from Stamboul to Galata exhibits considerable 
skill, being a floating bridge, with draw-bridges that admit the largest vessels 
to pass. A tax of about a farthing is charged for crossing this bridge. 

FRANK QUARTER. 

The opposite side of the Golden Horn, consisting of Top-hanee, Galata, 
Pera, and Kassim Pacha, is the Frank Quarter in which Greeks, Armenians, 
English, French and Jews reside, and the trades are carried on. Ship¬ 
builders, coopers, masons, tent and sail-makers, and many other trades, dis¬ 
tinguish this side of the port from Constantinople, w T here trading is not 
the rule, except selling and exchanging in the bazaars. 

Galata is at the corner of the Golden Horn, opposite Stamboul. The 
houses, as on the Turkish side, are all built of wood, except the embassies and 
a few hotels and houses recently erected. The streets are narrower and dirtier 


( 27 ) 


than those at Stamboul, paved with large irregular stones, worse than any 
in use in England before the time of McAdam, and, once laid down, never 
renewed or arranged. Many of these stones have become loosened, and, no 
one taking the trouble to replace them, lie about most inconveniently for pas¬ 
sengers. Among them are several stone door steps which have broken away 
from their fastenings and taken up a position in which they impede the 
pasenger traffic, and, either from the power of imitation, so strong in man, 
or the influence of the climate, even the French, who have shops in these 
streets, leave the ruts and hillocks as they find them, making no attempt to 
render these ways conveniently passable. 

Arabian Ponies, like those at Malta, are used as saddle-horses here : they 
manage to thread their way among the deep holes and blocks of stone, con¬ 
stantly slipping from side to side, but recovering themselves without falling, 
although some of the streets are as steep as Highgate-hill. 

GALATA WATCH TOWER, 

built by the Genoese to discover foes, is now used to discover fires. A sentinel 
is placed in the tower by night to keep a look out, and when he discovers 
a fire, calls to the passengers below to extinguish it. The Turkish guards 
with their muskets, and the passengers with sticks or umbrellas, beat upon 
the pavement and draw attention to the spot, and sakkas (water carriers) 
muster to extinguish the fire. These Aquarii, like their prototype in the 
celestial system, carry about enough water to quench the thirst of a labourer 
after his day’s work. Their means of extinguishing a jure are bottled up in a 
leathern bag, which is slung on the back or under the left arm. By the united 
powers, however, of hundreds of them, a fire is sometimes extinguished ; and if 
they fail by this process, the ravages of the destructive element are stayed 
by pulling down the houses to leeward, and any others that may be in danger. 
A curious law or custom is said to exist in Turkey with regard to land, viz. : 
when a house has been destroyed by fire, or pulled down to stay its progress, 
the freeholder must re-purchase his land, the purchase money being applied 
towards defraying the expences attendant on extinguishing the fire. 

From this tower there is a commanding view of Constantinople, the Sea of 
Marmora, with Mount Olympus and the Princess Islands, Scutari, Kadikoi, 

e 2 


( 28 ) 


and the Asiatic side of the Bosphorus, Top-hanee, Galata, and the Petit 
Champs des Morts, Golden Horn, and a vast extent of country rich with the 
growth of crops and fruits and delightfully green. About half a franc is 
charged for admission to this charming natural panorama, where hill and dale, 
mountain and valley, sea and land, plantations and palaces, kiosques and caiques, 
mosques, marts, and minarets immediately below the tower, sunshine above 
and around and snow in the distance, form a varied picturesque scene of beauty 
and grandeur on which the delighted sense loves to linger, until disturbed by 
the arrival of some new visitor whom one might wish five fathoms deep in the 
Bosphorus to prevent his disturbing a reverie so entrancing. 

Turkish Smoking Divan. Descended the large room about half way down the 
tower, the resort of foreigners. Here cigars, tchibouques, coffee and water are 
handed round by an attendant, and Captain B. and I had a tchibouque and 
ruminated on a window seat. Various persons came and went, most of them 
smoking and taking coffee. There is an air of stillness prevading a Turkish 
room, and all who enter it, natives and foreigners, feel its influence. Visitors 
enter this refreshment room of Galata Tower busy in conversation, the joke 
and repartee heard trippingly on the tongue. A few minutes more and the 
genius of the place has subdued the jocund laugh, and the loud conversation 
gradually diminishes, until those who came to laugh remain—to smoke. 

Hotels and Cafes are becoming plentiful, the principal of them established 
by Frenchmen. The cafejehs or Turkish coffee-houses are in the narrow parts 
of the oldest streets, most of them very poor, and the best of the visitors sit in 
an open yard in the rear forming a circle, with their tchibouques and nargiles 
resting on the ground in the inner circle. These cafejehs are remarkable for 
their quietude: the taciturnity of the Turks, while sipping coffee and smoking 
Sultana tobacco, forming a striking contrast to their neighbours the French, 
who are making cigarettes, smoking, drinking their wine, ale, or coffee, and 
chatting all day long in the neighbouring cafes or outside them, as on the 
Boulevards in France. 


AUSTRIAN STEAMERS 

Trade from the Adriatic to Constantinople and the Levant, calling at ports in 
the Mediterranean; five or six of their boats anchored in the Golden Horn at 


( 29 ) 


the present time are clean, well built, and well managed by a discipline as strict 
as that enforced in the Austrian armies. The government has an interest 
in the marine trade, and uses every means to prevent competition in those seas 
as well as on the Danube, where a Frenchman, Captain Magnan, lately 
travelling by an Austrian boat and known to have an interest in a French 
opposition company just started to trade on the Danube, was detained by 
the Austrian authorities and afterwards released, but the boatman who had 
conveyed him was censured by the authorities and found dead on the beach 
next morning. 


PERA. 

The suburb, so called from a Greek word signifying “ beyond,” forms the head 
quarters of diplomacy, and is chiefly inhabited by Franks, subject to their own 
domestic laws and protected by their own ambassadors. In 1831 a great fire 
in this district consumed about 20,000 houses, including the British Embassy 
and all that it contained, the ambassador being at the time at Therapia, a 
charming village on the Bosphorus. The ambassadors and charges d'affaires 
from various nations reside at Pera in winter, and on the Bosphorus in the 
summer. Russia and France have handsome diplomatic palaces here, and 
England has a very pretty residence for an embassy, which, however, it is 
proposed to present to the Turks, as Britain is to have one built of a style and 
grandeur commensurate with her importance. The English hotels are as 
unlike the French hotels and cafes as these are unlike the Turkish cafejehs. 

Misseri’s Hotel is the principal in Turkey, built by Englishmen at the 
highest and best part of Pera. Nothing can be more stately or better 
constructed. Quiet as a church, ere winter has compelled all England to 
cough through the service. Servants who speak all languages line the hall, 
and are very attentive, especially an agreeable, comely, naive, good looking 
young woman, a native of Switzerland, who is the perfection of chambermaids, 
as the rooms testify. Unobtrusive, but ever at hand ; speaking several 
languages; exhibiting an anxiety for every lodger, and delighted to hear the 

“ Bon jour ” of the formal Englishman ; 

“ Indeed, she shines all smiles, and seems to flatter 
Mankind with her black eyes for looking at her.” 


( 30 ) 


Misseri’s Hotel is the resort of the English, who are said, on the continent, to 
go where the charges are highest. Seventeen francs per day are charged 
for lodging, breakfast, and dinner, and one for servants—fourteen shillings and 
twopence per day. Dejeuner—cold meat and fowl, hot chops, coffee, tea, 
bread, butter, cheese, and vin ordinaire. Diner—soup, fish, vegetables, 
poultry and meat cut up a la Francaise, vin ordinaire, fruit in great variety, 
gateaux and a cup of coffee ; and a thirsty lodger may have a small quantity 
of wine during the day without extra charge. The beds are surrounded by 
mosquito curtains, a great luxury in this climate. My chum of the Teneriffe 
stayed at an hotel where mosquitos abounded and marked his face and hands 
like a plum pudding until he devised a plan for destroying them, viz. : covering 
himself with the bed-clothes, excepting one hand which was left as a trap. 
The mosquitos forced their sting into the exposed hand, which, being imme¬ 
diately closed, prevented a withdrawal of the sting, and a blow from the other 
hand killed them before they could escape. The company consisted of three or 
four French, as many Italians and Germans, and a few ladies, and above 
a dozen English captains and majors of the line, and generals of Bashi- 
Bazouks. The French and Italians are social; the English exclusive, dressing 
in their regimentals for dinner, and drinking champagne after. 

Captain Mississippi, a gaunt gentleman of middle height, descended in a direct 
line from one of the European Sovereigns, which of them did not seem quite 
certain. He was the critic and lexicographer of the company, and kindly took 
upon himself to correct every one, whether right or w T rong, and to explain the 
correct view of every subject from the Zoophyte to the steam-engine. Had been 
to Timbuctoo and therefore understood the figure of the earth, the tides, currents 
and winds. Had steamed to Mogador, and denied that Hercules could have 
“ grasped the ocean with a span ” - by extending his legs across the Strait of 
Gibraltar. Had considered the question of colonial rule, and was prepared to ex¬ 
plain to the government the reform required and the means of rendering the 
Cape a happy and contended colony. The questions of free trade, income tax, 
exchange, funding, French alliance, or any other subject interesting to the 
present generation, he settled with the minuteness of a microscope and the clear¬ 
ness of a Greenwich pensioner’s telescope. He was in high favor with the 
ladies, to whom he had delivered a discourse on erratic errors and diminutive 


( 31 ) 


discrepancies. They could not understand him, but felt that he was a genius. 
The gentlemen looked upon him as an amusing curiosity sent to kill time, but 
declined to argue with him during the hot weather. He had married early in 
life, in the hope of having two daughters whom he would train as models of 
human perfection ; and failing in this particular, was content to concentrate in his 
own person the advantageous qualities he had originally designed to share with 
them. He appeared to he fortune-hunting ; and if a clear head, indefatigable 
industry, and consummate address, are the means by which she is to he run down, 
he is likely to succeed. 

Major Smaulmakup is an officer of one of the Bashi-Bazouk regiments. He 
struts about the hotel entrance, smoking a cigar, like Bombastes of stage fame ; 
is very conceited, talks loudly on all occasions, as if he were still giving orders 
for military movements, is proud of his regimentals and his personal appearance, 
or station, or gait, we cannot ascertain which without putting the question, 
which would he dangerous. He eats and drinks enormously when not talking, 
and talks enormously when not eating and drinking; a ferocious man of the Don 
Quixote order, but of diminutive proportions, presenting the appearance of a 
hero who has been subjected to experiments in an exhausted receiver and come 
out quite shrunk. He travels with us by boat to Marseilles where he elopes 
with a frail French passenger, with whom we find him afterwards in a railway 
carriage bound for Paris. 

Herr Fitzmudlewhell is an aspiring young gentleman, with a tendency to 
grandeur; and not quite satisfied with nature’s favors, leaves no means untried to 
improve upon her by the aid of the tailor and cosmetique dealer. The possessor 
of a good bust, great shrewdness, considerable talent and comprehension on all 
subjects of ordinary interest. He has been placed in a mercantile house with a 
tolerable income, but fancies his proper destiny is in the artistic world or the 
guards, and consequently not refusing the profits of trade, devotes himself to 
the cultivation of his whiskers and sculpture. He has produced some medallions 
and statuettes which are much commended among his friends, especially a Tom- 
Thumb giant, an original subject on which he raised great hopes ; hut the world 
is so deficient in artistic taste that his models are far from being in request, 
although the missionaries of art daily exhibit them to the public gaze on the 
railings and broad pavements of his native city. He had built some handsome 


( 32 ) 


castles with the expected proceeds of these fine-art labors ; hut somehow the 
structures which were meant to he permanent were found to be fleeting, while 
the delicate productions which were expected to be in demand for the decoration 
of palaces and public exhibitions remained in the studio a standing disappoint¬ 
ment to which many a clever fellow has had to submit. He gives orders to the 
waiters with a haughty air, looks down upon the host of the hotel, requests that 
his boots may he brought up by some person with clean hands, and declares 
that if he ever has sons they shall be bred to the profession of a gentleman. 

There are some charming views from the housetop and from some of the rooms. 
Invited by two well-bred Italians to smoke a cigar in their sitting-room. They, 
like myself, were on a tour, and we subsequently went toKadikoi together. They 
spoke Italian, German, French, and a little English, and were excellent company. 

The street leading to Pera is very steep, narrow and ill paved, and although 
only about three-fourths of a mile in length, no one inflicts on himself the 
labor of ascending and descending it more than once per day. It is crowded 
by Turks, Greeks, Armenians, Persians, Circassians and Jews, selling fruit, 
cakes, watches, pictures, clothes, and a variety of vary-colored drinks. Dogs 
lie about in dozens, horses, donkeys, mules and porters, compel the traveller 
to be vigilant, and the presence of Greeks reminds him that property is fleeting! 
No one living in this district, worth sixpence, ventures to leave his residence 
after sunset, or too early in the morning, unless in company, and well armed. 
Robbery and murder being common. There are no constables in Turkey, 
except a few gens d’armes, not over active to protect property or detect rogues, 
and passengers will not interfere lest they should be afterwards waylaid. Mr. 
W. relates an incident illustrative of these doings. He was walking along a 
main street in Galata, and noticed two Greeks talking together. Upon approach¬ 
ing nearer, one of them leaped into the air and fell down dead. The other 
wiped the blade of his long dagger between his lips* and walked away. On another 
occasion several Greeks were humming a tune in the public street. No one noticed 
them particularly until they strengthened the sounds suddenly, which drew atten¬ 
tion. The Greeks gradually dispersed, all but one, who stood against the wall a 
corpse. A dagger had been dug into his heart, and the loud singing was evidently 
to conceal his groans. 


* Tasting the blood of a victim is supposed to prevent remorse. 





( 33 ) 


CHAMPS DES MORTS OR CEMETERIES OP TURKEY. 

The custom of the Mahommedans of burying but one corpse in a grave has 
necessitated extensive burial grounds which skirt the roads for miles with but 
short intervals. The Petit Champs des Morts at Pera is very large ; its main 
features are fractured tombs, lazy dogs, and cypresses ; no sound is heard but 
the rattling of the dry berry on the cypress tree, or the tramp of mules bearing 
bricks or wood slowly threading their way between the tombstones, or a de¬ 
jected family dolorously bemoaning the loss of a relative. The mid-day sun is 
shining brilliantly on the waters below, the city beyond, and the distant moun¬ 
tains ; boatmen ply the oars, larks are carolling above, and the busy hum of 
men mingles with the hissing of a dozen steamers at the bridge of Galata. 
Skirting this scene of activity, and overlooking it all, is the cemetery—lonely, 
silent as the dead beneath its sod! A plaintive moan breaks through the silence; 
the wailing of a man is heard, accompanied by deep sobs ! On approaching a 
secluded spot, sitting on a mound of earth surrounded by a thicket, are three 
women, and a youth with a swollen face and glaring eyes. He is shaking his 
head, and violently repeating in a sepulchral voice, “ La Allah—illah—Allah ! ” 
(There is but one God!) interrupted occasionally by a cessation of the shaking of 
the head, and calling aloud, “ Tephani, Tephani! ” The females are immov¬ 
able as statues ; their bodies bent over the earth. There is no interruption of 
the scene, but the shaking of the head and lamentation increase in violence. 
Twenty minutes elapse, and I conclude the poor fellow is an idiot, and the women 
his guardians, and with depressed spirits leave the scene. Upon inquiry, it 
appears that they have been engaged in devotional exercise, and that “ Tephani” 
so loudly bellowed was the name of a deceased relative buried beneath the spot, 
and this incantation, it was hoped, would enable him to traverse the sharp edge 
of the sword of death and arrive safely in Allah’s celestial halls. 

MOSQUES OF CONSTANTINOPLE. 

These Mahommedan churches are very picturesque. Their vaulted domes and 
gilt minarets rising far above the houses, surrounded frequently by tall plane 
trees, whose graceful branches form canopies that shelter the heads of hundreds 
of gaily dressed loungers ; and a richly sculptured marble fountain in the vici¬ 
nity, a few mules, and occasionally laden camels, make a scene as enchanting as 

F 


( 34 ) 


the traveller could desire or imagination depict. The richest mosque in this 
city is Santa Sophia, the cathedral of old Constantinople, dedicated to Wisdom, 
and built a.d. 325 by Constantine, the Christian emperor, set fire to in the year 
404, by Saint Chrysostom, and rebuilt by Theodosius, 415. Twenty years after¬ 
wards half the dome fell in. “ Every species of marble, granite, and porphyry, 
Phrygian white marble with rose colored stripes, green marble from Laconia, 
blue from Lybia, black Celtic marble with white veins, Thessalian, Molossian, 
Proconessian marble, Bosphorus marble with black veins, Egyptian starred 
granite and saitic porphyry were all employed.” A tax was levied on the people 
for the expenses of the building, and caused great discontent. When the Turks 
took possession of Constantinople they added four minarets and changed it into 
a mosque. Presented myself at the door of this mosque ; but my dragoman, a 
native of Naxos, who hates the Osmanlis, had a quarrel with the one who held 
the keys of the mosque, and in consequence we had to go to another instead. 
The Mosque of Sultan Ahmed, in the Hippodrome, is considered the chief 
mosque, and the only one in the Turkish Empire with six minarets. Spring¬ 
ing from the ground are four enormous marble columns, measuring thirty-six 
yards each in circumference. There are also several handsome columns of 
porphyry, a minber (pulpit) cut out of a solid stone and richly gilt and 
decorated. Suspended from the dome are numerous lamps, richly gilt and set 
with precious stones; six of them are set with emeralds, and suspended by 
golden chains. Bich cushions and copies of the Koran, inlaid with mother-of- 
pearl, lie about for use. The whole structure is grand in architecture and 
gorgeous in decoration. The work of one man!—yet it shames the petty 
structure built by a nation for the accommodation of Queen, Lords, and 
Commons. The base appears larger than the base of Saint Paul’s, but the 
dome is not quite so high. A rug is laid across the steps at the portal, 
upon which the infidel or non-muslimin wishing to enter must step. He 
is then required to take off his shoes, lest the dust from them should pollute 
the sanctuary.* At Sultan Ahmed’s Mosque a compromise is made, and the 
Giaour puts his feet into a pair of large Turkish slippers kept by the attendants 
for the purpose. 

* Stupid as this custom seems, the East Indian government have adopted it, and persons wishing 
to see the governor or his representative, in any one of the presidencies, “ must take off his shoes 
before entering the apartment, unless he ivears straps in which case the regulation is not enforced. 




( 35 ) 


Mohammedan Worship. In the gallery—on the ground—on the cushions— 
everywhere around Muslimin are praying or chanting extracts from the Koran, 
bowing their heads to the east, some in a sitting posture like the toy mandarins 
sold in England—others kneeling and bending down their bodies till their 
foreheads touch the ground—all very devout and enthusiastic, praying or 
chanting aloud, and, as there is no unity or concert among them, producing a 
buzzing confused sound not agreeable to the unpractised ear. The Iman 
(priest) in the minber is delivering a discourse which is quite supererogatory, 
as the devotees are wrapped up each in his own thoughts and engaged in his 
own separate devotions, praising Allah, Abraham, or Mahommed. Visitors enter 
and view the mosque, and pass out again quite unnoticed, not however as a 
right nor unaccompanied by an Osmanli. The law does not sanction the 
entrance of an infidel—that is to say, a Greek, Christian, Hindoo, Quaker, 
Shaker, or any person not a Moslem—into any mosque ; but in Constantinople 
it is now permitted, although strictly prohibited in other parts of the empire, 
and an Englishman has just been severely beaten by some Turks for entering a 
suburban mosque during the service. 

August 29th. Hired a couple of ponies for self and dragoman, and pro¬ 
ceeded in the saddle down the steep uneven streets of Pera, somewhat appre¬ 
hensive of the pony falling ; gained confidence very soon upon finding that 
although he slipped and stumbled continually, he avoided falling. We were 
successful in obtaining two English saddles, for the Turkish saddle-frames, 
made of wood, are very clumsy and fatiguing to ride in. Crossed over the 
Petits Champs des Morts ; traversed the Middle Bridge over the Golden Horn 
to Stamboul, through the bazaars and the old city to the Seven Towers, one of 
the remarkable sights of Constantinople. They were built in the fourth 
century. Each of them overlooks the city and suburbs, and commands a view 
of the Sea of Marmora. They enclose a large gallery and deep well, and 
chambers in which in times gone by prisoners were confined, as appears by 
their inscriptions cut in the stone walls. These towers are well placed for 
defending the town from attack, but are in a sad state of decay. 

Leaving the city we rode outside the old wall, which surrounds it on the 
land side, and is flanked by a deep ditch now dry. The roads are very dusty 
and uneven: a dead horse, lying where he fell some weeks since on the road- 

f 2 


( 36 ) 


way—sausages not being in demand in Turkey—causes my pony to shy 
over to the other side where dead men’s tombs extend, almost uninterrupted 
by road or ploughed field, for miles away. Keach the bank of the Golden 
Horn again and ride on the short dry grass to the Sweet Waters of Europe, 
(mentioned in page 25), at the source of the Golden Horn. There are 
three Sundays or Sabbaths kept in Turkey: on Friday the Moslem “ Juma,” 
on Saturday the Jew Sabbath, and next day the Christian Sunday; and each of 
them is to some extent observed by all the inhabitants of Turkey, less business 
is done and excursions by land and by water drain the capital of a large 
proportion of the residents. This day (Friday) being the Moslem Juma, a 
fete is held in the valley. The water flowing from the height is conducted 
direct to some stone basins and fountains, in the neighbourhood of a handsome 
kiosque and a suburban palace, the resort of the Sultan and his family on fete 
days. On the hill tops horsemen are galloping in short races. On the waters 
are gay companys in gilded caiques. In the valleys pic-nic parties, and ap¬ 
proaching by the roads, pedestrians, cake, coffee, tobacco, and sweet water 
vendors, and veiled beauties in arabas richly ornamented and drawn by 
Arabian ponies. We dismount and refresh ourselves with bread and coffee 
and make a cigarette each, and then canter away along the turfy uplands, and 
meet the Sultan and four of his sons, each in a separate araba driven by a 
coachman on the box, and attended by a chief eunuch (a nigger), and about 
ten cavalry soldiers dressed in imitation of English lancers. 

The bright sun is shining and birds singing high above us, gay holiday- 
keepers in varied costumes line the roads, in every direction, as far as the eye 
can see ; the brilliant city reflected sparkling in the waters of the Horn beneath 
us; and we linger to glance around again ere w T e trot into the busy town of 
Galata and ascend the steep and rugged road to Pera. 

Steamers in Turkey plying from the Golden Horn to the Princess Islands, 
Scutari, and the Bosphorus are very few and insufficient. They commence 
running at a quarter past eight in the morning (Mahommedan time), are generally 
crammed with passengers, and make very few journeys. They do not run 
from two o’clock to three, and cease altogether early in the afternoon; and 
persons requiring to go to any place by water, must then hire a caique, which 
is safe in smooth water only, and the boatman constantly requires the pas- 


( 37 ) 


sengers to trim the slight boat to prevent its capsizing. These caiques are 
nearly all rowed by one man each, and the passengers sit, not on seats 
stretched across as in England, hut on cushions placed at the bottom of the 
boat, and in this position, with the head just above the sides, have an agreeable 
lounge and glide along swiftly and smoothly. When, however, the sea runs 
at all rough, which it does frequently, with the wind off the Asian coast, 
caiques dare not leave their moorings, and the old trading skiffs are turned 
into passenger boats until the waters become calm again. The sculls and 
oars used on these waters are thick and bulbous between the hands and the 
rowlocks by which they balance the long blade and lighten the labour of 
pulling. 

THE BOSPHORUS. 

Which extends from the Pontus (Euxine) to the Propontis (Marmora) contains 
the prettiest and the grandest scenery in the immediate vicinity of Constanti¬ 
nople. The summer residences of Ambassadors to Turkey, of rich Armenians 
and Pachas, Turkish ministers, English and Greek merchants, interspersed be¬ 
tween the white marble palaces of the Sultan and his family, on both sides of the 
Bosphorus, have a charming effect among the trees and hills, while the deep 
bays and verdant promontories protect the villages from the boisterous north 
winds and afford good anchorage. 

The Turkish villages on the shore are all backed by landscapes of grassy 
knolls or sloping hills. Visited a friend at Orta Koi (centre village) a large 
dirty village, built very irregularly, at the mouth of a valley and intersected by 
a ravine. A kiosque is built on the shore close to the landing place, and a 
walk of ten minutes leads through the old town to the English quarter, built 
on two hills, where the residences are very large and pretty, mostly gained by 
ascending three terraces, each fronted with white lattice-work on which the 
green creeping plants are trained. These residences, viewed from the sea on a 
sunny day, the kiosque with the old village behind it, the large picturesque 
houses above the village, surmounted by the “Yildiz” palace, and the extensive 
cemetry of Top-hanee, with its thousand cypress trees, in the background, are 
enchanting. The residence of my host is very extensive and at present 
occupied by three branches of his family with their sons and daughters. The 


( 38 ) 


drawing-room is fitted in the Turkish style, a continuous cushion extending all 
round except where the principal door opens, and serving as a lounge and 
smoking divan. Grapes, tomatos, melons, and other fruits, grow freely in the 
gardens, and the open country in the rear being very little cultivated, affords 
ample riding and shooting grounds. 

All the.villages along this coast from Top-hanee to the Black Sea, although 
very picturesque, are long, irregular, and fallen much into decay, and in 
most of them a large proportion of the houses are uninhabited. In others 
where families reside, an attempt at entertainment is made by strumming on 
worn out pianos from which all the melody was driven before they left England 
and France. The villagers, native and foreign, spend most of their time 
smoking, playing billiards, cards, and dominoes in open cafes, or sleeping 
snugly in the corners of their rooms. 

Walked from Orta Koi to Pera, and about half way sat down at noon to 
admire a beautiful landscape. Looking over a deep dry ravine, a valley was 
perceptible, formed by undulating hills and small plantations. There was no 
human being near to be seen. This was a delightful solitude for a weary 
traveller, where Nature had distributed her beautiful productions and man had 
not yet improved them. After a time a buzzing sound began like the sounds 
of distant human voices, and crossing the ravine and descending into a valley 
beheld a large collection of Turks pic-nic-ing and ascended a hill in order to 
have a good point de vue. There were hundreds of both sexes, with their 
families, sitting in all imaginable positions and smoking tchibouques, cigars 
and cigarettes, eating cakes and drinking coffee, water, lemonade, and other 
refreshments: musicians, vocal and instrumental, tumblers, with merrymen, 
jokers, and fruit, sugared-water, and cake-venders. They had selected for 
their festivities a round pond or basin, above which arose seven stone terraces 
surmounted by some architectural monuments. Ladies of high and low degree 
were smoking, while sitting on the ground, and as all the women adopt a 
ferijeh (dress) of a particular family color early in life, and continue to wear it 
on all festive occasions, the reader may imagine the brilliant effect of 200 or 
more of them lit up by a meridian sun, on a clear day, in an eastern clime. 
Sat down among the men, who took up positions apart from the women, made 
cigarettes for myself, and the polite attendants brought me fire, for which there 




















SCUTARI CEMETERY 



















( 39 ) 


was no charge, and coffee, for which a charge of only half a piastre (one penny) 
was made. The fete was very simple, consisting principally of good Latakia 
tobacco and the merrymen’s had jokes. 

September 1st. Crossed in a Steamer to 

SCUTARI. 

It was here that the Persians used to pay their tribute to the Greeks. Walked 
through the cemetery, which appeared about three miles long and in some parts 
nearly as broad. This vast city of the dead is covered with cypresses, and the 
solitary passenger sees nought else hut tombstones and hears nothing but the 
sound of the cypress nut as the wind shakes the trees. The tombstones, like 
everything old in Turkey, are much decayed, and thousands of them have fallen 
from their positions and lie on, or one half buried in, the ground. They are 
made of marble, brought from the temples and palaces of Greece, and the tops 
of them are designed to shew the rank, profession or sex of the deceased. 

Turkish Funeral. Four men bear a shell, and another walks behind it. 
The shell contains the body of a man sewn up in linen. The four men raise 
two stones that covered the grave, remove the hones of the present tenant, and 
dig a hole at the foot of the grave into which they are placed and covered over 
with mould. The new tenant is then taken out of the shell, with the linen 
sheet on, and put into the old grave. There is one mourner in deep grief, who 
chants verses from the Koran. The two stones are replaced over the grave, 
covered over with a little earth, the party walk away with the shell, and the 
funeral is over. 

DANCING DERVISHES. 

“ The Dancing Dervishes, or mevelawites , are a kind of Mahometan monks, 
who live in community, in the monasteries called tekkes. The word ‘ Dervish 
signifies ‘poor.’ The hall in which the Dervishes execute their religious dances, 
is at the extremity of the court of the convent. The interior of this hall re¬ 
sembles at once a ball-room and a theatre. The centre presents a floor, per¬ 
fectly smooth and highly polished, enclosed by a circular balustrade, about three 
feet in height; some slender columns support a gallery, which forms the same 


( 40 ) 


circuit, and contains places for persons of distinction, a box for the Sultan, and 
others prepared for females. These last (termed the serail) are defended from 
the profane gaze by closed lattices, similar to those seen at the windows of the 
harems. The orchestra is placed at the end, opposite to the mirab , or pulpit, 
which is ornamented with tablets, inscribed with the never-failing verses of the 
Koran, and with the monograms of the sultans or viziers, who have been bene¬ 
factors of the order. All this is painted in blue and white, and exhibits a 
remarkable purity of colour, greatly enhancing the gay and joyous air of the 
place. One would imagine himself awaiting the performances of a class about 
to practise a waltz of Cellarius, rather than the religious exercises of a sect of 
fanatics. The Dervishes came slowly in, two-and-two; and the chief of the 
community seated himself upon a carpet of gazelle skins, before the mirab , and 
between two acolytes. He was a little old man, with a leaden complexion, 
wrinkled visage, and sparse beard; his eyes, sparkling from time to time, gave 
the only air of life which was discernible in his impassive, and almost corpse¬ 
like face. The Dervishes defiled before him, saluting him in the Eastern 
manner, with the most profound marks of respect, as if he were a Sultan 
or a Saint. This salute was at once an act of politeness, an obeisance, and 
a religious evolution—the movements were slow, rhythmical, and recurring;— 
and the rite finished. Each Dervish took his place in front of the mirab. 
Prayers commenced, and with them the genuflexions, prostrations, and grimaces 
usual to the Mussulman ritual. When they had chanted enough verses of the 
Koran, wagged their heads sufficiently, and made a satisfactory number of 
prostrations, the Dervishes rose in a body, threw aside their mantles, and 
again marched in procession—two-and-two—around the hall. Each couple 
passed in front of the Superior, who remained standing, and after exchanging 
salutations with them, made to each a sort of gesture of benediction, or 
magnetic pass; which was executed in a very singular manner. The last 
Dervish of each couple thus blessed, took by the hand one of the next couple, 
and appeared to present him to the Iman; the same ceremony being repeated 
from group to group, until all had passed. A remarkable change was already 
effected in the physiognomies of the Dervishes, thus prepared for their fit of 
ecstacy. On entering, they had a dull, depressed, and drowsy air ; their heads 
drooped upon their breasts, or were buried beneath their dark caps; but now 


( 41 ) 


their visages brightened, their eyes began to sparkle, they held themselves 
more erect, and trod more firmly, and the heels of their feet began to beat time 
upon the floor, with an involuntary sort of nervous action. To the nasal 
chanting of passages from the Koran, was now added an accompaniment of 
flutes and tarboukas. The tarboukas marked the measure, and formed the 
bass; and the flutes performed, in unison, a continuous strain of a very high 
pitch, and of wonderful sweetness. Motionless, in the middle of the circular 
area already described, the Dervishes appeared as if gradually intoxicating 
themselves with the music, so delicately barbarous and so melodiously savage ; 
of which the primitive burthen is traceable, perhaps to the earliest ages of the 
world. At length one of them opened his arms, extended them horizontally, 
and began to turn slowly round, without otherwise changing his position, 
gently moving his bare-feet, which made no sound upon the polished floor. 
His tunic, like a bird about to take flight, began to tremble, and slightly to 
rise and fall. The speed of the movement increased ; the fragile tissue of the 
dress, lifted by the air, in which it revolved, spread itself in a circle and took 
the form of a bell, until at length it resembled a mere whirlwind of white, of 
which the Dervish formed the centre. To the first who commenced these 
evolutions was soon added a second, then a third, until the whole band had 
followed, seized by some sort of irresistible vertigo. They waltzed with their 
arms extended, the head leaning upon the shoulder, the eyes partially closed, 
and the mouth half open, like bold swimmers, who abandoned themselves to 
the current of some flood of ecstacy. Their movements were regular, undu¬ 
lating, and showing an agility quite extraordinary; no apparent effort, no 
appearance of fatigue. Occasionally a single Dervish pauses. His robe con¬ 
tinues to flutter for some moments, until, no longer sustained by the rotatory 
motion of its wearer, it sinks again into quiescence, and resumes its perpen¬ 
dicular folds, resembling those of some antique Grecian drapery. Then the 
Dervish drops upon his knees, with his face to the ground, and a lay-brother 
approaches and enwraps him in one of those mantles which 1 have already 
described; as a jockey carefully covers the noble racer who has just finished a 
course. The Iman draws near the prostrate Dervish, mutters over him some 
sacred formula, and then proceeds to the next. Presently the whole brother¬ 
hood are prostrate, overpowered by the excess of their excitement, and the 


G 


( 42 ) 


violence of their exercise. Before long, however, they rise again; make once 
more the circuit of the hall, and issue from the apartment in the same order as 
that in which they entered it.” 

THE HOWLING DERVISHES. 

“ The hall of the Dervishes of Scutari is a simple parallelogram, devoid of all 
architectural character. Upon the bare walls are suspended a dozen or so of 
enormous tambourines, and some tablets inscribed with verses of the Koran. 
Beside the mirab , and above the carpet where the Iman and his acolytes take 
their seats, the wall presents a ferocious sort of decoration, reminding one of the 
chamber of a torturer or inquisitor. This consists of some darts, terminating 
in a heart of lead, whence hang chains, spikes, pincers, and many varieties of 
arms and instruments of the most barbarous appearance, and for the most 
incomprehensible purposes; but still, with that sort of horrible air about them, 
which makes the blood curdle and the skin creep, as when beholding the out¬ 
spread instruments of a surgeon, just prior to the performance of an operation. 
It is with these atrocious instruments that the Howling Dervishes scourge and 
wound themselves, when they attain the climax of their religious delirium, and 
when cries alone are inadequate to the expression of their holy phrenzy. In 
front were ranged the Dervishes in a posture of devotion, repeating in unison a 
sort of litany, intoned by one of their number, in a stentorian voice. At each 
verse they moved their heads forward and backward, with a motion calculated 
almost to produce a sympathetic giddiness in the spectators. Occasionally one 
of these last (among the Mussulman part of the audience), attracted by the 
contagion of this oscillation, quitted his place in the chancel and mingled with 
the Dervishes, where he knelt beside the others, and began balancing himself 
like a bear in a cage. The chant grew louder and louder; the movement of 
the heads quickened; the visages of the Dervishes began to grow livid, and 
their chests to pant. The speaker uttered his words with redoubled energy; 
and we awaited, with anxious expectancy, that which was to follow. Some of 
the Dervishes, excited to the proper degree, arose, and continued their bowing 
movement with such violence, that they seemed in daiiger of cracking their 
skulls against the walls, or of dislocating the vertebrae of their spines. They 
now formed a chain, by putting their hands on each other’s shoulders, and 




( 43 ) 

began to justify their distinctive name, by heaving up from the very depths of 
their chests a hoarse and prolonged cry, or howl, of 4 Allah-hou! ’ which hardly 
seemed to come from any human voice. The whole band, animated as it were 
by one feeling, retired one step simultaneously, and then threw themselves 
forward with an equally simultaneous plunge; shouting in a deep tone. Little 
by little the inspiration comes. Their eyes begin to shine, like those of wild 
beasts in the depths of a dark cavern; an epileptic foam gathers about their 
lips; their countenances are distorted, and shine lividly through profuse per¬ 
spiration. The whole line falls back at once, before some invisible gust, like 
reeds before a tempest, and then rises again as suddenly; and always, at each 
forward plunge, the terrible ‘Allah-hou! ’ bursts forth with increasing fury! 
How shouts of such unearthly violence, repeated during more than an hour, 
could fail to burst the osseous frame of the chest and flood the lungs with 
blood, from ruptured vessels, is inexplicable. The shouts became, after a time, 
mere roarings ; and one Dervish in particular, with a face of miraculous sallow¬ 
ness and leanness, a gigantic fleshless frame to match, and a voice deep and 
cavernous beyond expression, balanced his head amid its matted locks of long 
black hair, and tore up, as it were, from his skeleton chest, the growls of a 
tiger,—the roars of a lion,—the yells of a wounded wolf bleeding in the snow;— 
cries full of rage and yet of longing, the vague utterance of some unknown and 
fierce voluptuousness;—blended, sometimes, with sighs of human sorrow or 
weakness,—protests of the frail body, burned and bruised by the fiery and 
restless soul. Excited by the feverish ardour of this infuriated devotee, all the 
troop threw themselves back again in one mass, and then forward, like a line of 
intoxicated soldiers, yelling out, at the same instant, one supreme ‘ Allah-hou! ’ 
with a sound comparable to nothing earthly, unless to the voice of some 
mammoth or mastodon, buried amid the colossal herbage of an antediluvian 
marsh. The floor trembled beneath the measured tramping of the phrenzied 
band, and the walls seemed ready to tumble in ruins about us. And now the 
exaltation had reached its climax. The howls, or shouts, succeeded each other 
without interval or cessation, and a sort of wild-beast odour was emitted from 
this mass of heated and sweltering bodies. Through the dust raised by their 
trampling feet, gleamed vaguely, as through an ensanguined mist, visages 
convulsed, distorted, and phrenzied, illumined by white eyes and delirious 

g 2 


( 44 ) 


smiles. A youth detached himself from the group and advanced towards the 
old man. The assistants of the Iman took from the wall an exceedingly sharp 
sort of spike, or skewer, and handed it to their superior, who instantly trans¬ 
fixed with it both cheeks of the young devotee, without his showing the least 
sign of suffering. This operation performed, he returned to his place, and 
continued his movements as before. Two other fanatics now sprung into the 

0 

centre of the hall, and were supplied with two of those darts (already described), 
terminating in leaden hearts, and garnished with numerous small chains of 
iron. Taking these in their hands, they began a sort of poignard-dance, full of 
extraordinary and violent movements; but, instead of shunning the points of 
the darts, they sought every opportunity to wound themselves with them, and 
to scourge themselves with the iron chains, until they fell exhausted to the 
ground, reeking with blood and perspiration.” 

September 2nd. Went to the bazaars again, and bought a beautiful Cashmere 
worked table-cover, some handkerchiefs embroidered by women, natives of 
Cashmere, and some richly worked lady’s Turkish slippers, all remarkably 
fine and very cheap. Had my baggage placed on the hack of a Turkish 
liamel (porter) ; threaded for the last time the crowded lanes of Galata; 
stepped aboard a skiff and bade farewell to Turkey; rowed to the 

“GANGE”—FRENCH MAIL BOAT, 

a fine screw steamer that travels about twelve miles an hour, managed by 
a captain and four sub-officers, all very polite and attentive, dressed neatly in 
blue with gilt buttons. About fifty French, Turks, Greek and Italian sailors 
keep the steamer in good condition. We have four classes of passengers : 
the first and second live and sleep below deck, and have a long promenade 
abaft the funnel ; the third and fourth live and sleep on the pont (deck), 
and find their own provisions, or arrange with the steward for their food. 
The sailors have frequent quarrels with the deck passengers and among 
themselves, of which the captain takes no notice. I took possession of my 
bunk in a second-class cabin, and regretted it upon seeing my companions from 
Misseri’s in the first-class. Seven passengers—five Frenchmen, one Italian, 
and myself—slept in one cabin, sometimes with the windows closed and no 
air admitted but what reached us from the deck. Each of them had a large 


% 


( 45 ) 

bag or portmanteau, or both, besides sticks, umbrellas, guns, hampers, curiosi¬ 
ties, over-coats, pictures, pipes and liqueurs. Walking about the cabin or 
attempting to dress two at a time became impossible; some attempted to dress 
and undress in bed, but as there were but few inches of space between the bed 
and the roof, which compelled us all to enter sideways, sitting was impossible, 
and we found it most convenient to throw off some of the bed-clothes and 
retain some of our wearing apparel, and by completing our toilet in rotation 
and going on deck or into the saloon immediately, we managed to be ready 
when the bell rang at half-past nine o’clock for the dejeuner a la fourchette. 
This dejeuner consisted of vin ordinaire, de Veau , cotolettes, pommes de terre, 
fricandeau, gigot, choux a la barbare, cerveau, fritz * and gateaux, raisins , 
melons, frontage et pain d discretion, et une tasse de cafe. The dinner is very 
similar, the dishes being varied either in fact or in name and preceded by 
some potage au chasseurs d'Afrigue, potage d la mditre d’hotel, or some other 
kind, with a name equally appropriate and expressive. 

September 4. We steamed into the 

HARBOUR OF THE PIR^US, 

• 

shaped like a horse-shoe, and affording a good anchorage for shipping. Took a 
cup of coffee at one of the large desolate looking cafes, and walked about the 
town. There appears to be but little trade doing, although this is one of the 
four principal Greek ports. The soil is sandy and barren, scarcely a blade of 
grass is seen for two or three miles from the beach, but at the end of the har¬ 
bour a triangular piece of ground of three or four acres in extent is laid out very 
prettily as a promenade, and numerous trees planted tastefully about the 
town give it a pleasing appearance. Travellers, however, into the in¬ 
terior, have given charming accounts of the gorgeous mountain scenery 
and rich valleys and gushing springs ; where they found all the features 
of the most beautiful landscapes among the cloud-capped towers of Thes- 
salia, Arcadia, Corinth, &c. Some Scotch troops are billetted in the barracks, 
and others keep guard in the suburbs. They have been allowed, in con¬ 
sideration of the intense heat, which, at this period of the year is oppressive 


* i. e. } Pieces of any sort of meat or poultry brought in on a long skewer, like cats’-meat. 




in Greece, to wear caps which sit lig’htly on their heads, instead of those heavy 
hats they so bravely scaled the Alma with. Walked with Mr. P. inland to the 
top of the first range of hills overlooking the ancient Acropolis, Parthenon, or 
Temple of Minerva, which is still grand in its ruins and stands on so great an 
eminence that miles away at sea there is as good a view of it as from the Piraeus. 
We walked as far as we could with safety, wishing to arrive at the top of one 
of the highest hills forming the basin in which Athens is built, but the moun¬ 
tain tracks are in possession of young Greek Klepths, (robbers,) who plunder 
passengers, and not unfrequently murder them and leave their bodies to rot 
where they fall. The plains of Athens, as far as we could see, are very barren, 
and the city itself is now but a village of ruins surrounded by a few modern 
houses hurriedly built. Round the base of the Acropolis a Turkish village 
recently built forms a part of the new town called Plaka. “ The general aspect 
of Greece,” says a modern writer, “ is characterised by a very singular distribu¬ 
tion of its mountains ; they are neither placed in parallel chains nor in massive 
groups, but are so disposed as to enclose extensive tracts of land, which assume 
the appearance of large basins or circular hollows,” and this natural formation 
was doubtless the cause of Greece being divided into so many pretty kingdoms 
with separate interests, each one having its natural mountain barriers, acquired 
distinct habits and trains of thought. Hence the want of combination and the 
internecine wars, the bloody feuds between Athens and Sparta, each supported 
or opposed by neighbouring communities, the wars between the Lacedaemonians 
and Messenians, the conquest by the Macedonians, subsequent division by 
Alexander’s generals, and reduction into a Roman province, and finally the 
conquest by Mahmoud and his followers, who robbed the once violent but now 
factious Greeks of much of their glory, by, among other actions, twice driving 
them out of the celebrated pass of Thermopylae during the Greek revolution; in 
1821 by routing 700 Greeks, and in 1823 when Odysseus had the charge of the 
pass with 4000 Greeks that fled like cowards before the Muslimin. Where are the 
descendants of the 300 that opposed the march of thousands until but one alone 
lived to return and tell the fate of his brave countrymen \—where the representa¬ 
tives of 300 Argives and 300 Lacedaemonians who left their homes to decide by 
their prowess and devotion a question of difference between the two states, fought 
till but three men were left alive, when the two Argives looking upon them- 


( 47 ) 


selves as the conquerors, hastened home to report their success, and the one 
Lacedaunonian, Othryades by name, remained on the field of battle to strip the 
dead bodies of his enemies and carry their arms into the Lacedaemonian camp?*' 
The Greeks have a fond hope that they may some day capture Constantinople, 
and they have emissaries in all parts of the civilized world studying foreign 
languages, customs and politics. They have free schools in Athens, in Armenia, 
and in one of the Princess Islands, and hundreds of Greek boys are being edu¬ 
cated in Italy, France, Germany, England and Russia, all more or less at the 
expence of the state. Greek commerce is extending very rapidly, every native 
considering it his duty to further the interests of commerce as a means of the 
extension of political power. At the present time they threaten to monopolise 
the whole of the shipping trade in the Levant and in the Archipelago of Greece 
by a combination of their richest merchants in all parts of the world, and one 
ship of the new commercial fleet was started in August last to run between 
Liverpool and Constantinople, charging only 15s. per ton for merchandise, (half 
the usual charge.) It is a practice among the Greeks to wear the moustache 
and shave the beard, and this distinguishes them from Turks. They dress like 
French dandies, wear black frock coats and black hats, and cover their wives 
with showy dresses and jewellery ; vain of their personal appearance, they roam 
about on Sundays at Pera from cafe to cafe, smoking cigarettes and drinking 
sometimes a cup of coffee. They are sadly degenerated in patriotism, fidelity, 
honor and features, and are not near so good looking as the Turks. The nose of 
the modern Greek hears no resemblance to those in the old Greek sculptures and 
engravings. In business the Greeks are quick, subtle, intelligent, and attentive, 
as keen at a bargain as any Yankee or jew ; they marry young, and have a great 
pride in their children. The population of Greece is not however purely 
hellenic ; they style themselves generally, not Greek, but “ Romaic.” Albanians 
form about a fourth of the population, and at Athens and the Piraeus Maltese 
are very numerous. The Maltese at Smyrna, in the Levant, and at Constanti¬ 
nople, are robbers and assassins; but in Greece they bear a character for honesty ; 
finding, like the jews, that they are no match for the natives. In 1837 Capital 
Punishment was introduced, but before an executioner could he found, there 

* Othryades subsequently killed himself on the field of battle, resolving to have one fate and one 
tomb with his comrades. 




( 48 ) 


were 30 or 40 culprits waiting for execution, no man being willing to act as 
executioner. The guillotine is used, and the horror of the scene is sometimes 
increased by 'the attempts of the culprit to escape. He is allowed by law to 
walk freely and unbound to his doom ; and as most of the condemned are vigorous 
men, brigands by professsion, the struggles for escape are sometimes fearful. The 
executioner at length prevails by using his dagger freely until the culprit is 
exhausted by struggling and loss of blood, when he is conducted to the place of 
execution. 

September 5. Approach the Coast of Calabria, the southern extremity of 
Italy—“ Italie, empire du soleil; Italie, maitresse du monde; Italie, berceau des 
lettres, je te salue ! Combien de fois la race humaine te fut soumise, tributaire 
de tes armes, de tes beaux-arts et de ton ciel ! Connaissez-vous cette terre ou 
les orangers fleurissent, que les rayons des cieux fecondent avec amour 1 Avez- 
vous entendu les sons melodieux qui celebrent la douceur des nuits 1 Avez-vous 
respire ces parfums, luxe de l’air deja si pur et si doux 1 Repondez, etrangers, 
la nature est-elle chez nous belle et bienfaisante 1 ” Entered the 

STRAIT OF MESSINA, 

with the Calabrian Cape on the right, and Sicily on the left. From Mount Etna 
smoke is issuing. The mountainous rocks on the Neapolitan side are the 
wildest I have yet seen. They have the appearance of pumice stone, and are 
evidently of volcanic origin. At the foot of the mountains the coast is dotted 
with small villages, and the land is very prolific. The grape-vine appears to be 
the principal culture. All the rocks are tipped with trees as far as the eye can 
see, but there is no sign of any human being among these rocks, although, a 
little way inland near the high roads, robbers are in abundance. It is a charm¬ 
ing coast, and very pleasing to the eye that has not dwelt on any green spot 
since we left the Dardanelles. Steamed into the 

Port of Messina, said to be the ancient Syracuse, but the old maps shew 
Syracuse much further south. Hired a carriage and drove round the town, 
built on one side of the harbour, behind the quay, which is about half a mile 
long, with a row of commodious warehouses and magazines extending the 
whole length. The population of Messina is about 100,000. The streets are 
broad, and well paved with stones about twenty inches square. The shops 


( 49 ) 


are wretchedly poverty-stricken in appearance, although the lower floor or 
warehouse is often found stocked with merchandize. Several families live 
in each house above the stores, and women sleep or dream away their time 
lounging in the balcony, whilst the men play dominoes and other games 
at the cafes. There is no real business being done except among the ship- 
chandlers and agents on the quay. Behind the town are sunny residences pic¬ 
turesquely built on the slopes of the mountains. The houses are not numerous, 
and the soil being very prolific, and each house surrounded by trees and grass 
in abundance, and mostly separated by a narrow ravine, the whole presents 
a delightful landscape, the detail as charming as the tout ensemble is grand— 
vines, pears, melons, lemons, grapes, grow almost without cultivation, and the 
American cactus along the road sides bears fruit ripe and tempting to the 
wayfarer. About the centre of the town is a very pretty public garden, 
provided with an orchestra and seats and lamps. ’ Tis painful to see the 
public places in Sicily guarded by Austrian soldiers, who are hateful to the 
Sicilians, and dare not leave the town singly or they would not return alive. 
While landing we had an illustration of Sicilian brutality. Two Sicilian 
boatmen were fighting on the beach, and another boatman, seeing’ his friend 
was getting the worst of it, struck the opponent a blow on the head with 
an oar so forcibly as to break the oar into two pieces, and the indignation 
of the English, who were just landing, was so loudly expressed as to draw the 
attention of a guard, and he made an attempt to capture the fellow, who, 
however, to evade pursuit, fled into the harbour up to his armpits in the water. 
We heard on our return that the wretch had been caught and imprisoned. One 
peculiarity in the south and east of Europe is the number of lazy beggars, men 
and boys, who continually tease one to buy all sorts of merchandize, or 
to hire vehicles, following the traveller for miles with their importunities. The 
readiest way to rid ourselves of the nuisance we found was to listen to 
their eulogiums on the articles recommended, and then advise that they should 
avail themselves of such decided advantages as they had described. This 
advice, deliberately given, generally produced a smile and departure, although, 
sometimes, as at Pera, nothing short of a threat or a thrust with an umbrella 
was effective. The Maltese, when all other means fail, undertake to dive into 
the harbour for any gratuity that the stranger will throw. In England beggars 


H 


( 50 ) 


are extravagant enough when they light up a couple of candles to advertise 
their poverty, hut in Sicily they hire a boat and boatman to row them about 
the harbour, and dolorously implore alms to prevent their starving. Went 
to an elegant cafe, where the roof was supported by polished bluish marble 
columns, the cornices richly gilt, marble tables of various colours, rich crimson 
seats, and beautifully stencilled walls. Ordered ices, which the Sicilians call 
“ granite,” and small cakes ; twenty or thirty natives were there smoking, 
drinking and playing at dominoes. Steering out of the Strait of Messina we 
pass by the two points of land, styled by the ancients Scylla and Charybdis, 
which were a great terror to mariners, who supposed them to have some active 
power of malignity and to cast ships from the one to the other until they 
were wrecked. Scylla is a point of land at the corner of the Sicilian side of 
the Strait, forming two sides of a square. The strand is not much above high 
water mark. Charybdis, on the Neapolitan side opposite, juts out slightly 
from the mainland, and as the Strait at these points is not above two miles 
wide, a sailing ship entering' at night in a thick atmosphere, especially when 
ancient mariners had no fixed lights there, would be very likely to strike upon 
the low land at Scylla, or, discovering its danger there, steer wide for the Strait 
and run upon Charybdis, and thus give an example of the common saying 
“ avoiding Scylla to run into Charybdis.” There are also eddies at both these 
points, which, however, are not much noticed by captains of the present day, 
although in rough weather the Sicilian boatmen are careful to avoid them. 
Steered along the coast of Italy, through the Lipari Islands, with Mount Etna 
on our left and Stromboli on our right, both emitting smoke. ’Tis said that 
Stromboli never ceases to pour out its volumes except when ’tis flaming, and 
being a living volcano, ’tis inhabited by a few fisherman only, who at such 
times have to seek another residence. 

September 6. Had a storm at daybreak ; the vessel rolled about and the 
rain poured, but she kept her way, and, having a fair wind, made nineteen 
miles an hour; put on the sou’-wester garments and went on deck, where 
the third and fourth-class passengers, men, women and children were huddled 
together and the surf beating over them. 

September 7. Entered the 


( 51 ) 


GULF OF LYONS, 

where the rolling sea was almost as had as in Biscay’s Bay, and nearly every 
passenger sick or very unwell. The navigation in this Gulf is very difficult 
in consequence of the many rocks a-head; indeed ’tis so dotted with rocks, 
that the inexperienced eye can see no outlet. Night set in and we had not 
cleared them, and we determined not to go to bed until we passed them all. 
Mentioned to a fellow passenger that I apprehended having to swim for my life, 
and he, by way of encouragement, said that he had often steamed this course, 
and never had an accident but once, when the steamer went bowsprit on to an 
island on the right; the ship was damaged but no lives were lost. The captain 
diminished the speed, and occasionally stopped to let off the steam ; kept plenty 
of look-outs, and eventually sighted the Marseilles lights, which, although 
miles away, delighted us all. We entered the harbour safely soon after 
midnight; it was so crowded that in passing in at a very slow pace we 
damaged the bows of several sailing craft. No sooner had the ship dropped 
anchor than we dropped into bed, weary with watching, and glad of a little 
repose. We had not, however, many hours sleep, for some being anxious to get 
home, others to go ashore and see the town, others to start by the earliest 
trains for their ultimate destinations, very few slept soundly, and at daybreak 
we were packing, pacing the deck impatiently, or persuading the steward 
to prepare refreshments to comfort us after the fatigue and crowding of a week 
on ship-board. So great was the impatience to go ashore, that even the 
vivacious French promenaded the deck mute and anxious, seeming to forget 
that language was a medium for killing time. We hired boats to land us, and 
fiacres to take us to the cafes, and having had substantial dejeuners a la carte , 
returned on hoard to see our luggage thrown about, preparatory to its being 
sent to the douane. 

FRANCE. 

All our luggage, according to the custom in France, where every one is 
suspected of having among his luggage contraband goods and politics, was 
sent to the douane. Upon explaining that my portmanteau contained some 
tobacco and other trifles bought in Turkey, and that they were going to 
England, the officials tied them in a handkerchief and plombed them, that 

h 2 


( 52 ) 


is to say: a string was passed round the handkerchief, and the ends of the 
string passed through a piece of lead, which, being struck heavily by a 
hammer, precluded the possibility of untying the parcel without cutting. The 
octroi was paid and a certificate given to enable me to obtain a reclamation of 
the amount upon leaving France with the parcel unopened. When about 
to leave Havre for England, I applied for the restoration of the money; was 
sent to the Petite Douane , from there to the Grande Douane, where I was 
advised to go again to the Petite Douane , which I declined on the plea that I 
had just come thence ; was then advised to call on the morrow, which I 
also declined to do, as my boat was just about to start for England. Finally, 
success crowned my efforts, and the amount was returned. 

Marseilles Harbour is one of the principal European ports, being the 
nearest way from western and north-western Europe to all parts of the East. 
In six days, by passing through France, the traveller may go from London to 
Malta. In eight days, from London to Sicily, Greece, Gallipoli and Constan¬ 
tinople, while from Liverpool to Constantinople, touching at Malta and Greece, 
from seventeen to twenty days are occupied. Marseilles is a fine town, sur¬ 
rounded by high rocks. The streets are long, rather narrow, and, like the 
streets of New York, parallel and right angled, interspersed with boulevards, 
fountains, arches, and statues of bishops who have been so generous during 
epidemics as to distribute large sums of money provided by the lay population. 
On the cultivated top of one of the high rocks in the town, at the extremity of 
the Cours Napoleon, well supplied with seats and glaces , there is an excellent 
view of the harbour, which consists of two ports—th ejoliette and the grande 
porte —separated naturally by a rock, but a canal cut through it connects them ; 
about 2000 vessels can ride in these harbours. The successful merchants and 
men on ’change discontinue business during the hottest part of the day, when 
they retire to cafes and play cards, dominoes and billiards; however, they remain 
at their bureaux very late, especially on late post evenings. Stayed at the Hotel 
Canobiere , near the harbour. The ground floor is a commodious cafe; the walls 
are covered with plate glass and gilt mouldings, the ceilings with elegant, chaste 
and cheerful paintings, and when lighted up in the evening, ’tis quite dazzling. 
Here, at noon, about two hundred persons smoke, drink, chatter, and play at 
cards, and about three o’clock they repair to their various occupations. 


( 53 ) 


Had to attend the police station, next door to to the Douane , for a return of 
my passport, which had been given up to the steam-boat agents upon paying 
my passage by the Gange. Promenaded Marseilles for three hours and returned 
to the hotel much fatigued and covered with dust and perspiration, despite the 
green umbrella held up to shield me from the sun. Had a little repose, second 
dejeuner , and walked round the wretched district adjacent to the harbour, a 
place as filthy as any in London. The narrow dusty lanes, wretched houses, 
and squalid population reminded me of old Saint Giles’ before the worst part 
was pulled down to make way for New Oxford street. A triumphal arch in 
this dingy district shews the complete debasement of the Marsellaise, who are 
not allowed to sing their own patriotic song, but have (by order no doubt) 
inscribed on the arch—“A Louis Napoleon les Marsellaise reconnaissante.” 
Found some relief by taking an omnibus to the principal promenade of Mar¬ 
seilles, the Prado, a marine parade on the margin of a natural harbour in which 
some three-masted vessels float, the resort of the Marsellaise a pied a cheval 
et en voiture ; the bathing is also very good, and it is accordingly much patron¬ 
ised, being the only retirement from the dusty roads of the city. The banks 
abound with elegant villas and chaste cottages with a sea view, and one of 
them is charmingly laid out with gardens, grottoes, shrubberies, and gravel 
walks sloping down to the promenade. A cascade flows through the garden, 
divides into two streams down the green bank, continues its course under the 
coach-road, and rushes down the rocky beach into the sea. 

There are several Cafes Chantants at Marseilles, called Casinos, elegantly 
fitted and well lighted with gas, where the populace is nightly entertained 
with very inferior songs and recitations. No charge is made for admisson, and 
consequently they are crowded every evening. Hired apartments at the Hotel 
Canobiere, for two nights; but, tired of walking about the hot town, left after a 
stay of forty hours en route for Lyons by express, slept in the carriage, and 
arrived at 


LYONS 

at daybreak. Took some coffee and bread a la Lyonnaise, that is by 
sopping the bread in the coffee served in a basin. In the south of France 
the land is very fruitful and charmingly cultivated, and dotted with chateaux. 


( 54 ) 


Both sides of the Rhone and the Saone are as beautiful as the best English 
scenery, and upon ascending the height of Fourvieres at Lyons a complete and 
extensive view of the city and the surrounding suburbs is obtained, bounded 
by miles of green grass, skirted by well-made roads and bordered by lime 
trees. The streams of both rivers in some parts run parallel, and at others 
curve away and finally effect a juncture. Seventeen bridges cross the waters, 
eight over the Rhone, and nine over the Saone. The public squares are 
very fine, among them “ Bellecour,’’ considered the most magnificent in 
Europe. The visitor to the manufacturing town of Lyons looks about 
for the factories, and is surprised at not finding the flaming chimneys of 
Staffordshire nor the smoke-belching flues of Birmingham and Sheffield. 
Nothing of the sort is remarkable, and would not be suspected by a visitor who 
had not some previous knowledge of the place. The time-serving authorities 
of Lyons, in imitation of their master, have pulled down very many houses, and 
are building, with very bad materials, large houses on both sides of a long 
road to be called “ Rue de l’Empereur.” From Lyons to Paris by express, 
7 p.m. The carriages on the French lines are better, in many respects, 
than the English; they are wider, the cushions are better stuffed, the 
first-class have a commodious open basket-work receptacle, above the heads 
of the passengers, for umbrellas, small bags, parasols, etc, where the articles 
deposited can all be seen. They travel quite as fast as the English trains, and 
the fare is 20 per cent lower. The second and third class shew the number 
allowed to travel in each carriage—thus: “ 32 places and on many lines, as 
from Boulogne to Amiens, the third class are in every respect very comfortable, 
and some of them travel the distance, eighty miles, in two hours. Rolled along 
at forty miles per hour, stopping about every twenty miles to ring the bell, but 
not waiting long, as there were no passengers at many of the stations, the 
activity even of the vivacious French requiring some repose. We divided our 
time between attempts to sleep and the inevitable cigar, which is a luxury 
during a long journey in a railway carriage. Thanks to the engineers and 
stokers, the well-wrought carriages, and the smallness of the traffic, our train 
kept the even tenor of its way, like another Erebus encircling us by dusky 
night, conducting us through the fields of mourning, full of dark groves and 
woods, where every tree and shrub in the sombre atmosphere seemed to shrink 



( 55 ) 


and start from us with the velocity of lightning, and leading us finally where 
the smiles of Aurora softly glided into the rich beams of the God of day, spread 
before us the luxurious champaign and the flowing river, and welcomed us by 
the joyous song of birds just freshly leaving their green resting-places. Arrived 
at Melun on the Seine, twenty-eight miles from Paris. On both sides of the line, 
farms with rich swards, plenty of water, and thousands of poplars. Arrive at 

PARIS, 

and, having travelled all night in a cap, forget my hat, which is left in 
the carriage. Hire a fiacre and go for it afterwards. Nobody can tell me any¬ 
thing about it. After applying to several officials, one undertakes to make 
inquiry. Wait ten minutes, and then remind him. He is annoyed at my 
intruding just when he is mending his pen, walks to a distant part of the 
office, and sits and joins in conversation with other clerks. Applications are 
made to several other officials, who express a doubt whether the hat can be 
found, and one is industrious enough to tell me where the Lost-Property Office 
is, and there I find a person whose particular duty is the charge of treasure 
trove. He says, “The application is made too soon : come to-morrow,”—and then 
I recognise the very man to whom I applied for the return of Mr H.’s hat, left at 
the Paris southern terminus some years ago, when he said the application was 
made too late. Paris has been much improved since the abdication of Louis 
Philippe. Napoleon le Petit having found some plans drawn under the 
direction of Napoleon le Grand, has judiciously used them for the modern 
improvements, and pulled down many of the thickly populated neighbourhoods, 
to remove the poor from the vicinity of the Tuileries, and built a double row of 
large houses in continuation of the Rue Rivoli, and thus kept the discontented 
Parisian workmen employed. The Palais d’lndustrie, in the Champs Ely see, 
is a clumsy building of rough stone. Many of the old bridges are pulled down 
or partly rebuilt and a new one made across the Seine near the Ecole Militaire. 
The dirty old Place du Carrousel is pulled down, and the Louvre much ex¬ 
tended ; with small gardens at one of the entrances, and surrounded by large 
gilt railings like those at the British Museum. The magnificent Tomb of 
Napoleon, under the dome of the church at the Hotel des Invalides, is nearly 
finished, and the Hotel de Ville is being decorated and ornamented with 


( 56 ) 


statuary and fountains. Under the landing of the first staircase is a group 
of two figures—Victoria and Eugenie, hand-in-hand, and holding bouquets. 
A new feature of the present ruler of France is the surrounding of the palaces 
(like the other despots of Europe) by a foreign body-guard. Arabian Zouaves 
have possession of all the gates of the Tuileries and the Louvre, and the 
Parisians, in their simplicity, are delighted with the picturesque Moorish dress 
of these foreigners, quite unconscious that they form a harrier between the 
present tyrant of France and the people of France.* 

September 12. Took my seat in a railway-carriage for Havre, and in two 
hours and a half arrived at Rouen, once the hot-bed of feudalism, and chief 
city of Normandy. But now its days of chivalry have quite passed away; 
spears, bows and arrows are supplanted by factories and tall chimney-pots. 
The collateral descendants of the warrior barons have metamorphosed into 
stokers and factory workers. Seen from the rail, Rouen is remarkably pretty 
and fertile, but the chimneys are the most remarkable feature. Eleven minutes 
stay and on we fly through a delightful country to the busy port of Havre, 
the first place that has presented any appearance of active business from 
Marseilles to here. Walk about the dirty town; get the passport vise', em¬ 
bark in the French steamer “ Alliance”—a generic modern name which is 
made applicable to almost everything that can be eaten, drunk, or used, 
from a sandwich to a steamer, and finally embracing nearly everything in 
Europe. Sleep soundly on board the steamer, and am awoke at half-past 
five next morning by the cessation of the engines and paddles in Southampton 
harbour. The custom-house authorities are all asleep, and the newly-arrived 
passengers have to wait three hours for their luggage to be examined, and then 
are allowed to depart for their respective homes, happy at finding themselves 
in old England, and en route to their families and fire-sides. 


i 


( 57 ) 


RESUME. 

Turkey is the anomaly among dynasties ; Mahommedans surrounded by 
Christian powers, who hate them for their religion, and envy them the posses¬ 
sion of the finest climate, scenery, seas, and rivers, in the world. Yet they 
hold on their sway, unbending to remonstrance and unyielding to force; 
careless of the “ Outer Barbarians ” and the strifes of surrounding nations ; 
not over anxious about their safety, feeling that the muscular arms and fierce 
onslaughts by which they conquered their present Empire are, in all emer¬ 
gencies, to be relied on for the same services when necessity shall call them 
into vigour. Held by other nations to be a feeble power, whose vigour is 
enervated by a slothful and luxurious course of life, yet they maintain their 
power against the political and the military machinery which seems destined 
to expend its energies in attempts to subdue a people whose innate strength is 
unexhausted by repeated attacks. Unaided they left their native soil and 
captured a new Empire in opposition to the will of Europe, and, unaided, they 
repel the attacks of Western, Northern, and Central Europe ; and the efforts 
of several of the strongest powers are required to drive them from any impor¬ 
tant position, as at Navarin, where the small fleet of Turkey did not refuse to 
accept the unequal contest when challenged by England, France, and Russia; 
and in the recent war, when, led by Omer Pasha, they drove the invading 
Russians from Citate, Giurgevo, and Silistria, before the English and French 
had reached the scenes of action. 

In politics Turks are as children, and the most simple code of laws is best 
adapted to their capacity and habit of thought. Of administrative power they 
have no elaborate theories, but are very effective in the practice of it. They 
smoke while other nations rack their brains with thinking, talking, and 
bartering ; and they do quite right, for, having but few wants, the wear and 
tear of study are not necessary for comforts or necessities. There is no 
such institute as a Turkish post-office; for price currents, love letters, social 
and political intrigues, give the Turks little trouble, and the good old custom 
of visiting and carrying despatches on horseback still prevails. 

Living in a land of plenty—with Smyrna for a granary, Latakia for a tobacco 
estate, a vast extent of country where the grape grows spontaneously, Circassia 

i 


( 58 ) 


and Cashmere to supply the turban, the ferijeh, and the tunic, and Arabia to 
provide coffee, their principal beverage—there is no reason why the maddening 
studies of more civilized nations should rack the Mahommedan brain, and turn a 
mild and benevolent, though ignorant and luxurious, race into a moving mass 
of emaciated schemers. 

They have been accused by reviewers and politicians with domestic unskil¬ 
fulness—requiring foreigners to manage their ships, cultivate their gardens and 
superintend their trading transactions; accused by those who ought to be 
aware that the pride of the haughty warlike Turk, who holds in subjection 
several nations of no mean importance, not his inability, prompts him to hire 
foreigners for the performance of labours, commercial and domestic, which 
the Muslimin consider derogatory. 

Turks are as conservative as Lord Derby professes to be, and Lord Pal¬ 
merston is, and equally tenacious of custom and privilege. 

Their present habits sustain their strength and health, and why should they 
change them ] Their necessities are few, why should they increase them 1 
They are open-hearted and generous, friends of the brave and promoters of 
freedom. When the Hungarians required shelter and protection, the Porte 
gave them both in defiance of French advice and Austrian threats. They 
have abolished the slave-market, and are establishing a funding system and 
railroads under English advice, and they are now (March) offering gifts of 
land to families inclined to settle in the Empire. Turks are not fashionable: 
the dress worn by Mahomet is still the pattern for the Turkish costumier. 
They have been charged with a want of industry and perseverance, gross 
neglect of their streets and antiquities. This is all true: their streets are 
narrow, dirty, and ill-paved; their old fortifications, towers and obelisks in 
a state of dilapidation, streets un-named, and timepieces set to a new mea¬ 
sure of time, determined by a chronomist every evening. But what shall 
we say of the Franks, whose streets are dirtier, narrower, and worse paved 
than those on the Turkish side 1 The Empire of Turkey was established 
four centuries since, when architecture had not made those advances in ele¬ 
gance and substantiality which modern residences in large cities exhibit. 
The houses were built by enterprising individuals, who dotted them down 
in the first convenient place that presented itself. But ’tis difficult, never- 


( 59 ) 


theless, to find public buildings superior to the mosques and palaces of 
Turkey. The Frank quarters, where money is plentiful and the buildings 
comparatively modern, are not in any respect superior, while they are less 
picturesque. The British Consulate is established in a narrow back lane, 
difficult to find, and not five yards from a filthy heap of dust, vegetables, 
and offal, deposited in the road-way, steaming and stenching as one passes 
by ; and the landing-place at the Galata end of the bridge is so dilapidated, 
that every passenger who walks over it, does so at the risk of broken limbs. 
The domestic habits of Turkey are, no doubt, a disgrace to the Empire. The 
Sultan, whose mother presented him with two Circassian females in his boy¬ 
hood, has about a dozen wives, and from his seraglios the pachas are supplied 
with wives from among the odalisques, or court damsels. This practice 
strengthens his power and domination, as each new marriage gives him a new 
adherent, whose interest and sympathies are with the reigning monarch. 
Ministers and wealthy Muslimin keep more wives than they can control: 
hence watchfulness and suspicion, the necessity for Negro servants, constantly 
armed, to accompany Turkish women, the artificial system of concealing 
their beautiful faces beneath the yakmash, and that enervation of the brain 
and feebleness of intellect so remarkable in Eastern princes. We have a 
powerful illustration of this sad result in the young King of Oude, whose 
early habits made him a healthy, shrewd young man. His father feared the 
rivalry of the son, and condemned him to the female apartments, where, in 
the course of years, luxurious habits enfeebled his reflective powers, and his 
inability to rule the kingdom was made a pretext by the East Indian Govern¬ 
ment for robbing him of it. The present Sultan, Abdul Medjid, is also 
remarkably deficient in intellect, is entirely ruled by his Ministers, and occu¬ 
pies his time between attention to his ladies and building new palaces. 

Notwithstanding their want of business habits, their slow method of thought, 
and their unsystematic laisser fciirc mode of conducting every transaction, 
except in war, the Turk is very likely, if he take advantage of the European 
intimacy which is being thrust upon him, to come safe out of his difficulties, 
and take a leading part in the controlment of the world. 

i 2 







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TO MISS F. 


ON THE OCEAN: 


SO NT WET: 


THE WORDS AND THE MUSIC BY 


JAMES SULL IY A N 


*S V V '•'WWW 


APRIL, 1857. 




ENTERED AT STATIONERS’ HALL. 


















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TO MISS F. ON THE OCEAN. 















































































































































































































































































































































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TO MISS F. ON THE OCEAN. 


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